Wojciech Marczewski – Platinum Lions, Masterclass, the Big Five at the 49th PFF
The Platinum Lions Lifetime Achievement Award of the Polish Film Festival will go to Wojciech Marczewski this year. The choice of the recipient is commented on by director Jan P. Matuszyński, Chairperson of the Programme Council of the Polish Film Festival: ‘Wojciech Marczewski is one of the indisputable pillars of Polish cinema. His films still shine with universality and topicality. The Programme Council of the Polish Film Festival was happy to select him as this year’s winner of the Platinum Lions for lifetime achievement without further discussion. Not only because of his strictly cinematic achievements, but also his immense contribution to the education of new generations of filmmakers in Poland and around the world. Mr Marczewski’s legacy links the history and future of Polish cinema in a beautiful way. I am delighted that he joins the esteemed group of recipients of this exceptional award’.
The Festival has prepared three events featuring Wojciech Marczewski. The first will be a screening of Escape from the ‘Liberty’ Cinema, the director’s iconic work, awarded the Golden Lions at the Festival in 1990.
The second event will be a masterclass by Wojciech Marczewski, hosted by film expert Piotr Pławuszewski. This meeting will attempt to answer the question of what it means to be a filmmaker. One that leaves an indelible mark on viewers with his works. While discussing The Housemaster, Shivers, Escape from the ‘Liberty’ Cinema or Weiser, the participants will reflect on what makes Marczewski’s cinema a vehicle of memory and history and how the director looks at his extraordinary achievements from a time perspective. This masterclass in cinema will remind us that Wojciech Marczewski’s work is always a starting point for serious conversation. Because it is the only thing – the director seems to be saying – that makes it worth turning the camera on.
Wojciech Marczewski is also taking part in the Big Five section. The director chose the film The Maids of Wilko by Andrzej Wajda because, as he says: ‘it’s one of those films that, completely uninvited, invade our memory and dig into it persistently’. He will talk to film scholar Anita Skwara about the film, what made him choose this particular title, what kind of viewer he is and how his cinematic world was shaped.
Wojciech Marczewski is a film and television director, screenwriter, producer, respected teacher, lecturer at film schools in London, Berlin, Copenhagen, Łódź, Warsaw and Katowice, and an unquestionable authority of the Polish film community. He is a recipient of the Golden Lions for Escape from the ‘Liberty’ Cinema (1990) and the Silver Lions for Shivers (1981) and Nightmares (1979), as well as the Special Jury Prize for Time of Betrayal (1997). Awarded the Silver Bear and the FIPRESCI Prize in Berlin for Shivers.
Wojciech Marczewski’s artistic work, although relatively small in quantity as it consists of only four cinema films, five television films, several etudes and one TV series, is striking for the range of its themes, directorial consistency and the scale of its artistic challenges. Wojciech Marczewski’s cinema looks at the human condition in the 20th century at its most dramatic points, determined by history, ideology and the spirit of the times. However, these are always intimate, delicate stories, moving in their depth and clarity, impressionistic images created from metaphors, fantasies and memories.
Wojciech Marczewski – Platinum Lions, Masterclass, the Big Five:
Film Screening of the Platinum Lion recipient
Escape from the ‘Liberty’ Cinema”, director: Wojciech Marczewski
Masterclass by Wojciech Marczewski
The meeting will be hosted by Piotr Pławuszewski – registration required
The Big Five | screening of a film selected by Wojciech Marczewski:
The Maids of Wilko, directed by: Andrzej Wajda, after the screening the meeting with Wojciech Marczewski will be hosted by Anita Skwara
The 49th Polish Film Festival in Gdynia will take place on 23rd–28th September 2024.
