Director and writer Franz Hofer was born in Malstatt, as son of a state-railway-official. He went to school there and in Trier, where his father worked for a while. He left school in 1899, and went to Altenburg , before returning to the stage. 1944 he attended the opening night of one of his comedies at the Stadttheater Goerlitz, and he - living in Berlin - probably died in the last days of the War or the ongoing economical chaos in post-war Germany.
He began his career as a stage actor, later he was also busy as a writer and director at the Zentral Theater in Berlin.
He died during the last days of World War II and his death remained nearly unnoticed because of the chaos at that time.
He made his first contact with the film business as a screenwriter.
In the 10s he became one of the most influential film workers of the early German film.
From 1913 he realised numerous movies as a director, for most of them he also wrote the script. To his huge repertoire belong comedies, thrillers and sensation movies which were very popular in those days.
He founded his own production company "Hofer-Film GmbH" in 1920 which concentrated on the popular sex education films.
The rise of the sound film era rang in the end of his career and he was no longer able to go on from the successes of the past years.
One of his first movie stars was the actress Dorrit Weixler who already died in 1916 at the age of 24.
His activities diminished in the next years and he only realised "Drei Kaiserjger" , afterwards he retired from the film business.
