Agnieszka Holland

Agnieszka Holland (born November 28, 1948 in Warsaw, Poland) is a film and TV director and screenplay writer.

Related Topics:
November 28 - 1948 - Warsaw - Poland

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She was born to a Jewish father and a Catholic mother, and was raised a Catholic. Best recognized for her highly politicized contributions to Polish New Wave cinema, Agnieszka Holland ranks as one of Poland's most prominent filmmakers. Holland graduated from the Prague Film and TV Academy (FAMU) in 1971. She began her career as an assistant director for the Polish film directors Krzysztof Zanussi and Andrzej Wajda, including Zanussi's 1973 film Illuminacja and Wajda's 1982 film Danton.

Related Topics:
Jewish - Catholic - New Wave - Prague Film and TV Academy - 1971 - Krzysztof Zanussi - Andrzej Wajda - 1973 - Illuminacja - 1982 - Danton

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Holland's first major film was Provincial Actors (Aktorzy Prowincjonalni, 1978), a chronicle of the tense backstage relations within a small town theater company that served as a metaphor for Poland's contemporary political situation. The film won the International Critics Prize at the 1980 Cannes Film Festival.

Related Topics:
Provincial Actors - 1978 - 1980 - Cannes Film Festival

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Holland only directed two more major films in Poland, ' (Gor?czka, 1980) and ' (Kobieta samotna, 1981), before emigrating to France, just before martial law was declared in Poland in December, 1981.

Related Topics:
1981 - Martial law

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Holland received an Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Language Film for her 1985 film Angry Harvest, a German production about a Jewish women on the run in World War II.

Related Topics:
Academy Award - 1985 - Angry Harvest - World War II

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The director's defining work, and perhaps her best film, was Europa Europa (1991), based on the biography of Solomon Perel, a Jewish teenager who fled Germany for Poland following Kristallnacht, in 1938. Upon the outbreak of World War II and the German invasion of Poland, Perel fled to the Soviet-occupied section of Poland. Later captured during the German invation of Russia in 1941, Soloman convinced an SS officer that he was German, and found himself enrolled in as elite SS military academy. The film won a Golden Globe and garnered Holland her second Academy Award nomination for best foreign film.

Related Topics:
Europa Europa - 1991 - Solomon Perel - Kristallnacht - 1938 - German invasion - Soviet - 1941 - SS - Golden Globe

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A friend of the great Polish writer and director, Krzysztof Kie?lowski, Holland collaborated on the screeplay for his film, '. Like Kie?lowski, Holland frequently examines issues of faith in her work.

Related Topics:
Krzysztof Kie?lowski - Faith

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In an 1988 interview, she said that although women were important in her films, feminism was not the central theme of her work. Rather she suggested that when she was making films in Poland under the communist regime, there was an atmosphere of cross-gender solidarity against censorship, which was seen as the main political issue.

Related Topics:
1988 - Feminism - Communist - Censorship

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Holland's later films include Olivier, Olivier (1992), The Secret Garden (1993), ' (1997), the HBO production Shot in the Heart (2001) and Julia Walking Home (2001). Her most recent film is The Healer (2004).

Related Topics:
Olivier, Olivier - 1992 - The Secret Garden - 1993 - 1997 - Shot in the Heart - 2001 - Julia Walking Home - The Healer - 2004

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