Chris Kraus

Chris Kraus was born in Göttingen in 1963. After stints as a journalist and illustrator, he studied at the German Film and Television Academy from 1991 to 1998, where he now works as a lecturer.

For ten years, Chris Kraus has enjoyed an outstanding reputation as one of Germany’s most acclaimed screen writers. Nominated twice for the German Screenplay Award, he won the Screenplay Award of the Federal State of Baden-Württemberg for “Four Minutes” as well as the 2002 German Award for the Advancement of Film for Best Screenplay for his debut feature “Shattered Glass”. Kraus also received several awards for his directing achievement, such as the 2003 Bavarian Film Award.

The writer-director spent more than eight years developing “FOUR MINUTES”, a lot more time than the movie’s title would suggest. “I have always believed that motivation is just another word for talent. But what if it’s different? What if someone has talent, but lacks motivation? When a story revolves around an artist, that’s a crazy premise: creating a character that could achieve anything, but aspires to nothing. Most artists, including myself, are haunted by the imagination that it could be the other way round.”