Andrzej Wajda

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Andrzej Wajda

Andrzej Wajda, Warsaw (Poland), May 2006
Born March 6, 1926 (1926-03-06) (age 81)
Suwałki, Poland

Andrzej Wajda (born March 6, 1926 in Suwałki) is a Polish film director. Recipient of an honorary Oscar, he is one of the most prominent members of the Polish Film School.

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A major figure of world and Central European cinema after World War II, Wajda has made his reputation as a sensitive and uncompromising chronicler of his country's political and social evolution. Once dubbed a symbol for a besieged country, Wajda is known for drawing from Poland's history to suit his tragic sensibility—crafting an oeuvre of work that devastates even as it informs. His films are also famous of their visual sides. Wajda shows some symbolic scenes, very often he transforms some paintings onto the screen or makes new versions of some paintings from polish and European history. He always tries to give the right mood and atmosphere of period he is telling about, by referring to particular visual characteristics. Wajda makes great epic pictures as well as some existential, psychological ones. The son of a Polish cavalry officer murdered by the Soviets in 1940 in what became to be known as the Katyn massacre. After the war, he studied to be a painter at Kraków's Academy of Fine Arts before entering the Łódź Film School.

In 40`s he was a member of Polish United Workers' Party in Kraków.[1] On the heels of his apprenticeship to director Aleksander Ford, Wajda was given the opportunity to direct his own film. With A Generation (1955), the first-time director poured out his disillusionment over jingoism, using as his alter ego a young, James Dean-style antihero played by Zbigniew Cybulski. There were also other future legends starring in this movie - Tadeusz Łomnicki, Tadeusz Janczar and Roman Polański. The Polish Film School was ready to act.

Wajda went on to make two more increasingly accomplished films, which further developed the antiwar theme of A Generation: Kanal (1956) (The Silver Palm Award at Cannes Film Festival in 1957, ex equo with Ingmar Bergman's "Seventh seal" and Ashes and Diamonds (1958), also starring Cybulski. Wajda started working in theatre, where he showed many famous spectacles ("Hatful of rain","Two on a seasaw", "Hamlet").

While capable of turning out mainstream commercial fare (often dismissed as "trivial" by his critics), Wajda was more interested in works of allegory and symbolism, and certain symbols (such as setting fire to a glass of liquor, representing the flame of youthful idealism that was extinguished by the war) recur often in his films.[citation needed]But he explored other fields of human activity making for example a french new wave style film "The Innocent sorcerers", with jazz music by Krzysztof Komeda, starring Roman Polański in one of the episodes. But then Wajda returned to a war theme in a story about Jewish boy "Samson"

In 1967, Cybulski was killed in a train accident, whereupon the director articulated his grief with what is considered his most personal film, Everything for Sale (1969). The 70's is the most lucrative and great time for Wajda's artistic activity. He made over ten films, some of them were acclaimed as masterpieces like "Pilat and others", "Lanscape after battle", "The Wedding", "The Promised Land", "Man of Marble", "The Orchestra Conductor" - starring John Gielgud, "Rough Treatment", "The Birchwood" or "Maids of Wilko". Wajda continued his work in theatre and many of his most famous shows were shown at that time (his versions of Dostoyevsky's "The Possessed" and "Idiot" - "Nastasja Filippovna","Play Strindberg", "November night","The Immigrants", "The Danton affair". Wajda's later devotion to Poland's burgeoning Solidarity movement was manifested in Man of Marble (1976) and Man of Iron (1981), with Solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa appearing as himself in the latter film. The director's involvement in this movement would prompt the Polish government to force Wajda's production company out of business. For the film, Wajda wins the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. In 1983 he directed Danton starring Gerard Depardieu in a title role , a film set in 1794 (Year Two) dealing with the Post-Revolutionary Terror. For some critics in Poland,the film carries sharp parallels with the Post-Revolutionary period in Russia as well as with fascist Germany. But in fact Wajda shows how easily revolution can become terror and how quickly it can start to "eat its own children". Then Wajda made also "Love in Germany", "The Chronicle of amorous incidents" and his film version od Dostoyevky's "The Possessed". In theatre Wajda met Dostoyevsky for the third time ("Crime and punishment")and directed some other fabulous shows like "Dybuk" or "Antygone". In 1990 he showed another film masterpiece "Korczak".

In the early 1990s, he was elected a senator and also appointed artistic director of Warsaw's Teatr Powszechny. He continued to make films, addressing the topic of World War II in 1993's The Crowned-Eagle Ring and 1996's Holy Week.

In 1997, the director went in a different direction with Miss Nobody, a coming-of-age drama that explored the darker and more spiritual aspects of a relationship between three high-school girls. in 1999 there was a big artistic and box office success with Wajda's masterpiece "Pan Tadeusz". After that Wajda made a fanstastic political television spectacle "Bigda idzie!", starring marvellous Janusz Gajos in a title role and another masterpiece, the film version of "The Revenge", starring Roman Polański and Janusz Gajos in main roles. At the 2000 Academy Awards, Wajda was presented with an honorary Oscar for his numerous contributions to cinema; he subsequently donated the award to Kraków's Jagiellonian University. In February 2006, Wajda received an honorary Golden Bear for lifetime achievement at the Berlin International Film Festival.

Andrzej Wajda has been married four times. His third wife was popular actress Beata Tyszkiewicz with whom he has a daughter Karolina (born 1967). His fourth and current wife is actress and costume designer Krystyna Zachwatowicz.

Wajda has just finished working on a very personal project, film "Katyń" about the Katyn massacre, in which his father lost his life. The director shows this tragedy from the perspective of those ( mothers, wives and daughters) who await for their relatives. Andrzej Wajda founded The Centre of Japanese Art and Technology "Manggha" in Cracow, he leads also his own film school www.wajdaschool.pl where students have different one year courses (led by famous European film makers) and work on their own projects. Many polish actors became famous due to their acting in Wajda's films (Daniel Olbrychski, Wojciech Pszoniak, Andrzej Seweryn, Jerzy Radziwiłowicz or Krystyna Janda).

There were rumours saying that in the movie "Ashes" ["Popioły"] the director - A.Wajda gave permission to drop a horse off the cliff alive. The animal is inhumanly dropped into the ravine. While faling down it breaks its legsand after that crushes its head on the rocks. sources: http://www.ekoswiat.com.pl/niezabijaj/pdf/2002-06-04.pdf http://anchesenamon.blox.pl/2007/11/Mordercza-sztuka.html#ListaKomentarzy http://barche.blog.onet.pl/2,ID265585305,index.html However, this information cannot be confirmed in source materials therefore one should treat it as false one. In fact there was an artificial horse falling down off the rocks.

Man of Iron won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1981. Three of Wajda's works—The Promised Land, The Maids of Wilko, and Man of Iron—have been nominated for an Academy Award for best foreign language film. In 2000, Wajda received an honorary Oscar from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, as another Pole who received the Award after Warner Brothers,Leopold Stokowski, Zbigniew Rybczyński, Alan Starski, Ewa Braun, Roman Polański or Jan A.P. Kaczmarek..

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