I was born in 1945 in Germany and studied German and fine arts in Tübingen, Munich and Stuttgart. First I was a teacher at various high schools, then for years on research trips to many countries of the world. In 1990 I founded a company for graphics and media. Since 1995 I am a freelance writer, musician, artist and seminar leader. I am married, father of two children and live with my family in the near Koblenz/Germany

Ever since I can remember, I have been writing ... already as a child ... countless poems, stories. Mostly I added drawings to them, later I made music to them. Film is my dream medium, where everything that means something to me comes together: music, images and words.

Already at the age of 12 I had my first film camera - still with a hand crank to wind it up. On all my travels I took a camera with me.
Always and everywhere I made small films: experimental films in Super 8, school films and small documentaries on various topics.
In 1994 I wrote my first film treatments (Magic of Music and the Monk of the Amazon).

I published the "Monk of the Amazon" as a novel in 2012.

Please have a look around here. If you like a material and want to know more about it - for example how expanded it already is, please contact me at
nfo@lemuria.de

Thank you for your interest!
Sincerely!

Your Dietrich von Oppeln

My credo concerning movies
For me, films are interactions with the conscious, especially with the subconscious and unconscious. They are a wonderful medium to create situations, events and worlds in the synergy of word, image and sound, where things can happen that are otherwise not possible and rarely happen in the "real" world.

My films are not depictions of reality, but basically fairy tales, even if they have real aspects and even refer to real places and times. As in my novels, I am concerned with portraying great characters who behave extraordinarily in extraordinary situations. So my greatest joy is when viewers recognize themselves in these characters and leave the cinema feeling inspired, sublime, and more than they were before the film.

Many of today's films are overloaded. Often the action comes before the meaning, the deeper meaning. I want to create films that can also linger. That delight with artistic camera work, balanced and meaningful lighting and color, and great supporting music. Even the dialogues can be a little different from the brash everyday dialogues that you often find in films today. For me, film is still an art form and should respect the aspects and rules of dramatic and epic art.

I am inspired by films of the Italian Neorealism Antonioni, Fellini, Visconti, Pasolini and also by works of Fassbinder, Wim Wenders and Volker Schlöndorff, whose beginnings I witnessed back in the 70's and followed avidly - just to name a few. In the present, I consider Katja von Garnier and Tom Tykwer to be significant German directors.

Among the international directors, Bunuel, Renoir, Sidney Lumet, Ang Lee, Frank Darabont, James Cameron, Tim Burton, the Wachowski Brothers and my idol for many years, Steven Spielberg, stand out for me.

Why none of my films are set in Germany and most of them in the USA is for the simple reason that I am American by my basic mental and emotional attitude and spent many years in the USA.

What attracts me so much to the profession of "film" is the magic that can be created with it. A magic that takes people out of their everyday lives. A magic that points to worlds and leads into worlds that we have lost, forgotten or neglected. Good worlds, great worlds. I don't think much of films that show us our daily misery. I think a lot of films that give us new courage to live and love, to forgive and start anew. I would like to create such films together with the right artists.

Writing films and making films is a confrontation with the world, but above all it is a confrontation with oneself.

Contact: info@lemuria.de