Tom Tykwer and Franka Potente make a dynamic team both on-screen and off.

The director and star, two of the biggest names in contemporary German cinema, gained international attention with their dazzling 1999 film, "Run Lola Run." They re-teamed last year for "The Princess and the Warrior."

Reflecting the growing internationalism of movies, Tykwer spent this past year in Italy, directing "Heaven," an Italian- and English-language film written by two Polish screenwriters, and stars Cate Blanchett.

Earlier this year Potente starred in her first English-language film, "Blow." Her second, "The Bourne Identity," opens this Fall.

The Book: American audiences tend to shy away from foreign-language films. They don't want to see dubbed films and they resist reading subtitles. That seems to be changing in the wake of such art-house hits as "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and "Run Lola Run."

Franka Potente: Once a film is subtitled, people think it is an art-house movie and art-house movie means intelligent, philosophical. People get scared when a movie comes across as intelligent; they just want to be entertained. But if we start making movies which bring these elements together Á-like "Run Lola Run," like "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," like "The Princess and the Warrior"Ñit's a whole new way of looking at movies. Intelligent movies don't have to be difficult or serious.

Tom Tykwer: That's the secret of all these unusual successes. If a film can deliver basic human issues as well as good action, it can be as complex as it is entertaining. There are philosophical levels in these films that you don't have to digest, but if you want to you can. They don't force you to behave as an intellectual; rather, they're an invitation to think.

Potente: Kids today do video games and play on the internet. They have learned how to look at an image and read at the same time. I think that helps make subtitled films more acceptable.

The Book: Do you think the increasing acceptance Á-and successÑ of foreign-language films is having an impact on American-made movies?

Tykwer: Absolutely. I don't think "American Beauty," "The Matrix" or "Fight Club" would have been made five years ago. They use a different kind of film language. Ask writers and directors about the tension in their films and they say it's because so many of them were influenced by European films. And vice-versa. European filmmakers have been influenced by Hitchcock and John Ford. I see new doors opening; people are interested in exchanging ideas and are looking for inspiration in each other's work. [The Mexican-made film] "Amores Perros" blew me away. I think we are at the beginning of a new chapter in cinema.

The Book: In the United States it seems that films are divided into either popcorn movies or art-house. Is that true elsewhere?

Tykwer: Yes, except maybe France. It's a battle that has been going on since the invention of film: the industry itself doesn't accept films as art but, rather, as a product. Of course, even the most art-house oriented film has to have some aspect to make it marketable. If it's not marketable, you can't show it. The French are able to make good art films that are marketable. I think the New German Wave of the 1970's was like that, too. You went to see a new Fassbinder film no matter what it was about, because you were interested in this direction of film. The art was much more related to politics back then.

The Book: Society has changed, at least here in the U.S. People are not as political as they were in the 1960s and seventies.

Tykwer: Perhaps, but I see a strong hunger among younger audiences for films that don't just leave you behind at the end of the movie. They want something to think about and discuss after the final credits roll. Think of "Being John Malkovich." And "American Beauty" was a highly political film, but also entertaining. It was about a cultural phenomenon: how we look at our families, how we behave, how we set up an environment that is actually destructive to ourselves. It is a film that is really very reflective of our reality.