Helena Zengel

Helena Zengel has emerged as one of the most talented young European actors, with her German feature film career (in three consecutive features by female German director/writers), launching with her supporting role in German director/writer Leonie Krippendorff’s psychological drama, Looping (2016), co-starring Jella Haars, Lana Cooper and Marie-Lou Sellem, and produced by Jost Hering. Zengel had her first starring role at the age of nine in director/writer Mischa Schilinski’s tense family drama, Die Tochter/Dark Blue Girl (2017), alongside Kirsten Mielke and Artemis Chalkidou, which premiered at the Berlin Film Festival.

Zengel made her extraordinary breakthrough lead performance as a deeply disturbed young girl in German director/writer Nora Fingscheidt’s strong drama, Systemsprenger/System Crasher (2019), with Albrecht Schuch, Gabriela Maria Schmeide, and Lisa Hagmeister, and premiering at the Berlin Film Festival. Zengel had her Hollywood debut as a co-star with Tom Hanks in director/co-writer Paul Greengrass’s Western adaptation of Paulette Jiles’s 2016 novel, News of the World (2020), co-starring Michael Angelo Covina, Ray McKinnon, Mare Winningham, Elizabeth Marvel and Bill Camp, but which lost money for Universal Pictures with a mere $12.7 million gross (against $38 million costs).

Helena Zengel remarkably secured her fourth starring role before turning 16 as the lead in director/co-writer Pia Marais’ adventure drama, Transamazonia (2024), alongside Sabine Timoteo, Jeremy Xido, and Sergio Sartorio.
Zengel, which world premiered in competition at the Locarno Film Festival and premiered in the U.S. in the main slate of the New York Film Festival. Zengel earned her second co-starring role in an American-produced movie in director/writer/producer Isaiah Saxon’s fantasy adventure, The Legend of Ochi (2025), co-starring Finn Wolfhard, Emily Watson, and Willem Dafoe, and released widely by A24 after premiering at the Sundance Film Festival.