Film director
Fatih Akin is a German film director, scriptwriter, actor and producer with Turkish origins.
Fatih Akin’s Films often show a setting that’s “in the streets”. In his first renowned full-length film Short Sharp Shock (1998), Akin told a story about three petty criminals, heavily influenced by his model, Martin Scorsese’s gangster films.
On the 25th of August, 1973, the son of a worker and a primary school teacher was born in a civil environment and shaped by the first generation of Turkish immigrants. Even though Fatih’s parents and the oldest son Cem are educated to be faithful Muslims, they both went to a Catholic kindergarden, and later grammar school. In 2000, Fatih did a degree for visual communication at the Univerty of Fine Arts of Hamburg. Because, when he was 16 years old, he knew he wanted to be a director. So he found a job at Wüste Film Production of Hamburg, who produced his first film later on.
With his third full-length film Head-On (2004), the story of an unusual marriage of convenience starring Biröl Ünel and Sibel Kekilli, the director succeeded in an international breakthrough.The melodrama was awarded the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival - it’s the first time in 18 years for German films. It was followed by an invitation to the Cannes Film Festival, where the scriptwriter and director took the judge spot for the Un Certain Regard section next year.
In 2007, The Edge of Heaven even got a script award on the French Film Festival. The migration drama told a story about six people and their lives between Bremen and Istanbul. His film Soul Kitchen, a comedy about a pub owner Zinos and his personal hommage in Hamburg, is his commercially strongest work with 1.3 million audience in Germany and it’s also a hit for foreigners.
The local neighborhood always had Akin’s back. The passionate DJ and amateur boxer feels most at home in Hamburg-Altona. There, he lives with his wife, the actress and director Monique Akin, and their two kids.