Andrzej Wajda

  • Andrzej Wajda – Nastazja AKA Nastasya (1994)

    Andrzej Wajda1991-2000ArthouseDramaJapanese Female Directors
    Nastazja (1994)
    Nastazja (1994)

    Quote:
    This film was born of a theatrical production of Nastasya Filipovna, first staged in 1977 at the Stary Teatr in Cracow. I based my adaptation on the last chapter of Fyodor Dostoyevski’s The Idiot, in which Prince Myshkin and Rogozhin return to the past in a conversation over the dead body of Nastasja.

    For years I was tormented by apprehension, and later, by certainty that there exists some better solution for a stage version of The Idiot. Finally chance came to my aid. When in 1981 I visited Kyoto, I saw a performance of La Dame aux Camélias. In this way I met Tamasaburo Bando, one of the greatest Japanese performers of female roles.Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Bez znieczulenia AKA Rough Treatment (1978)

    1971-1980Andrzej WajdaDramaPoland
    Bez znieczulenia (1978)
    Bez znieczulenia (1978)

    Quote:
    A famous Polish journalist presents a problem for the powers-that-be when he displays his full political skill and knowledge on a television show featuring questions and answers on a world conference by a panel of journalists. His enemies take away his privileges when he is away. The shock of being “unwanted” parallels a deeper disappointment in his private life: his wife has an affair with a jealous young rival, and after 15 years of marriage and two daughters wants a divorce. She offers no explanations as he tries to untie these problems himself. All the moves he makes are the wrong ones. He takes on drinking heavily with students eager to attend his seminar after discovering the class has been canceled. The journalist, once suave and commanding is reduced to silence.Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Umarla klasa (1977)

    1971-1980Andrzej WajdaArthousePerformancePoland

    The Dead Class (1975), by Tadeusz Kantor and the Cricot 2 company, is considered one of the most innovative and influential works of twentieth-century theatre. The breakthrough first version of the production – performed to great critical acclaim, but only rarely seen live by audiences outside Poland – was documented on film in 1976 by the Oscar-winning director Andrzej Wajda.Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Polowanie na muchy AKA Hunting Flies (1969)

    1961-1970Andrzej WajdaComedyPoland

    Quote:
    The authors decidedly refute the myth of the woman – guardian of the hearth. Their heroine is a modern and an energetic girl who demands her partners to be successful in every field. A beginning writer and translator, running from his wife and mother-in-law, falls into her trap. What happens to a sensitive man in an encounter with overwhelming female force?Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Pilat i inni AKA Pilate and Others (1972)

    Andrzej Wajda1971-1980DramaGermanyTV

    Quote:

    I wasn’t satisfied with the first two versions of the script which I had commissioned in Warsaw.

    Luckily for me, at that time Bulgakov’s novel The Master and Margarita was first published in Poland. I was thrilled by it. I realized that I would not find a better text for the film than the story of Pilate. Everything was there: Christ, Pilate’s dark intrigue, Judas’ betrayal and the desperate loneliness of the single disciple and Evangelist.Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Lotna (1959)

    Andrzej Wajda1951-1960DramaPolandWar

    Poland, during the World War. Lotna is a magnificent specimen of Arabian horse, the
    pride of her owner, too old to actually ride her but to whom she remains faithful
    nevertheless. The Polish cavalry army is also proud of their land, and loyal to rules, and
    custom. The German army is leading an overwhelming speed attack with tanks, an
    almost unheard of weapon, and bringing a way of life to an end. It’s the last battle
    between Lotna (speed horse) and Blitzkriega (speed war).Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Samson (1961)

    Andrzej Wajda1961-1970DramaPolandWar

    Nominated for the Golden Lion in 1961 at the venice Film festival

    “Samson” is the story of a Jew, Jakub Gold (Serge Merlin), at the polytechnic university in Warsaw imprisoned and sentenced to 10 years for accidentally killing his friend in German- occupied Poland. In prison he makes several contacts that will factor later in the movie. The prisoners are released when Warsaw is bombed. Jakub is sent to the Warsaw ghetto where the Jews are “doomed to death for the crime of existence” and is assigned to picking up corpses from the streets and helping to provide them with a Jewish burial. Along the way he picks up his own mother. After one such burial Jakub and another man escape from the ghetto. After he escapes he desires to go back into the ghetto to share the fate of his kinsmen. Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Pierscionek z orlem w koronie AKA The Crowned-Eagle Ring (1992)

    Andrzej Wajda1991-2000PolandWar

    Quote:
    A young commander of Warsaw Uprising tries to continue his activity under conditions of Soviet occupation. He makes contact with an insurgent from the People’s Army, now the head of the regional committee of the PPR. In the mask of a collaborator he wants to save the rest of his people.

    The screenplay was based on Aleksander Ścibor-Rylski’s novel “Pierścionek z końskiego włosia” / “The Horsehair Ring”, withheld by the censors in 1965 and first published in 1991. Wajda included in the film a scene modeled on the famous scene with spirit lamps from “Ashes and Diamonds” (1958). (1958), in the vicinity of a meeting between Marcin and Wiśka, who are awaiting the outcome of talks between the PPR and AK (Home Army).Read More »

  • Andrzej Wajda – Danton [Extras] (1983)

    1981-1990Andrzej WajdaDocumentaryFrance

    Quote:
    Best known for political films such as Ashes and Diamonds and A Generation, Polish director Andrzej Wajda travels to 18th-century Paris in Danton — but his politics remain firmly grounded in the 20th century. Much like his most recent film Katyn, which chronicled the murder of 15,000 Polish officers by the Soviets during World War II, Danton takes us to the morning after the French Revolution, when the monarchy has been toppled and the revolutionaries have no one left to fight but themselves.Read More »

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