Krzysztof Zanussi

Krzysztof Zanussi was born in Warsaw on June 17, 1939. That is, on the eve of the outbreak of World War II. A physicist from the University of Warsaw, and a philosopher from the Jagiellonian University of Krakow, he also graduated from the Lodz Film School in 1966. Before his academic training as a filmmaker, he was part of the Amateur Film Club of the University of Warsaw, and there he studied. he was fond of the films of Ingmar Bergman , Luis Buñuel , Jean Renoir and Jean Vigo . And he will manage to attract international attention at the festival with his short From him The death of a provincial , his graduation work in Lodz.

The interests of the deep look at the man and the world of Zanussi have not been limited to the world of cinema, he has also worked in the fields of theater, opera and television. Integrated into the so-called “third Polish cinema”, his Catholic convictions permeate a cinema of social concerns, always concerned with the person. A disciple of the late Andrzej Munk , together with Andrzej Wajda and Edward Zebrowski he promoted a movement, “The cinema of social concern”, whose name says it all.

Since 1979 Zanussi has directed the production company TOR Film Studio, which made possible the trilogy of colors by his good friend Krzystof Kieslowski. He has also chaired the European Federation of Audiovisual Producers between 1974 and 1981, is a professor at the University of Silesia in Katowice since 1992, and a member of the Vatican’s Pontifical Commission for Culture.

From his filmography, La estructura de cristal (1969), a song of friendship, stands out. In Illumination (1973), awarded at Locarno, he describes precisely how a student’s life will be progressively “illuminated” as he assumes responsibilities to which he finds meaning. And Camuflaje (1977) is a look at two very different ways of understanding university education. InMarriage contract (1980) his reflection is about the nature of the conjugal pact.

The election of the first Polish Pope in history, John Paul II, inspires From a Far Country (1981), a biopic by Karol Wojtyla up to the moment he is elected pontiff; precisely in 1997 he will adapt a play by Wojtyla, The brother of our God . The 1980s are important for Zanussi, as in 1984 he was awarded the Golden Lion in Venice thanks to The Year of the Quiet Sun , the love story between an American soldier and a Polish refugee, in the years of World War II, truncated by a silent sacrifice that leads to a rethinking of things. The filmmaker will repeat the motif of the war inWherever You Are… (1988) and in Maximilian Kolbe (1991), a portrait of the famous Christian martyr, who was exchanged for another prisoner of war who was to be executed by the Nazis. From Zanussi’s most recent filmography, Persona non grata (2005) stands out, which follows a prestigious diplomat who has a hard time coping with his widowhood.