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Thomas Plenert, born 1951, in Nauen, studied at Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen "Konrad Wolf" in Potsdam and at the famous film school in Lodz, Poland. With his camera work for highly-praised documentary films such as Jürgen Böttcher's "Rangierer" ("The Shunting-Station Workers") and "Die Mauer", Plenert soon made a name as one of the most accomplished cinematographers of German cinema.
In 1988, he worked for Volker Koepp's short documentary film "Feuerland" – which marked the beginning of a longtime collaboration. Since then, Plenert has filmed nearly all of Koepp's films and has significantly contributed to its poetic images. Furthermore, he has won the German film award for his work in Koepp's film "Kalte Heimat" ("Cold Homeland"). Although he mainly became famous for his camera work in documentary films, Plenert has again and again worked as a cinematographer for feature film productions. He provided Jan Schütte's film "Fette Welt" ("Fat World", 1998), a drama about homeless persons, with its raw, naturalistic look and has filmed several episodes of the TV crime film series "Polizeiruf 110" – and has won a Grimme award for his camera work for the episode "Kleine Frau", directed by Andreas Kleinert. In the movie season 2006/07, Plenert again proved how easily he was able to switch between feature films and documentary films when he was in charge of the camera work for both Bernd Böhlich's highly-praised social comedy "Du bist nicht allein" and Volker Koepp's film "Holunderblüte" ("Elder Blossom").
In 2008, he received the DEFA Foundation's Prize for the Promotion of German Cinematic Art. Plenert continued to work on both, documentary and fiction films in the further course of his career. He was the cinematographer on Werner Schroeter's atmospheric, stylized drama set in South America "Diese Nacht" ("This Night", FR/PT/DE 2008), on Matthias Keilich's comedy "Auf Doktor komm raus" (2010, TV), starring Henry Hübchen, and on Bernd Böhlich's provincial comedy "Krauses Kur" (2009, TV) as well as on Böhlich's TV movie "Die verlorene Tochter" (2011) of the "Polizeiruf 110" series. In between, he was cinematographer for Volker Koepp's "Memelland" (2008) and "Berlin-Stettin" (2009) as well as Jens Wenkel's "Lagos - Notizen einer Stadt," among others.
Between 2012 and 2018, Plenert worked only on documentaries. The wide variety of subject matters covered in them is also reflected in the image design. The thematic spectrum ranged from the analytical, nostalgic Swiss portrait "Heidis Land - Eine Reise" (2012) to "Family Business" (2015), about a Polish woman who comes to Germany as a private nurse in order to support her family back home with the money she earns here.
With Volker Koepp he was filming "Livland" (2012), "In Sarmatien" (2013) and "Wiederkehr" (2017, TV), about the poet Johannes Bobrowski. Annekatrin Hendel hired him for her documentaries "Familie Brasch" ("The Brasch Family", 2018), about the Eastern German family of artists and party officials, and "Schönheit & Vergänglichkeit" ("Beauty and Decay", 2019), about prominent ex-bouncer and photographer Sven Marquardt.
Plenert worked on fiction feature films again with Susanna Salonen's romantic drama "Ausgerechnet Sylt" (2018, TV) and Bernd Böhlich's "Und der Zukunft zugewandt" ("Sealed Lips", 2019), about female GDR citizens condemned to silence over the crimes committed against them by the Soviet. In November 2022, the last documentary film photographed by Plenert was released in German cinemas, "Die Frau des Dichters" ("The Poet's Wife") by director Helke Misselwitz, with whom Plenert had worked successfully on several occasions since the 1980s.
Thomas Plenert was married to the editor Gudrun Steinbrück-Plenert, with whom he also had an intensive working relationship throughout his career. From 1997 until his death, he was a member of the Berlin Academy of Arts, Section Film and Media Art. Thomas Plenert passed away on July 15, 2023 in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.