Krzysztof Kie?lowski

Krzysztof Kie?lowski (June 27, 1941, Warsaw – March 13, 1996, Warsaw) was an influential Polish film director and screenwriter, known internationally for his film cycles Three Colors and The Decalogue.

Death and legacy

Krzysztof Kie?lowski died on March 13, 1996 during open-heart surgery following a heart attack, and was interred in Pow?zki Cemetery, Warsaw, Poland. Situation of his grave: on entering by the main entrance turn right and you will see his grave a short distance in, off the path to the right (very close to the perimeter wall). The grave has a sculpture of the thumb and forefingers of two hands forming an oblong—the classic view as if through a movie camera.

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March 13 - 1996 - Pow?zki Cemetery

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The small sculpture is in black marble on a pedestal slightly over a meter tall. The slab with Kie?lowski's name and dates lies below.

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Years after his death, he remains one of Europe's most influential directors, his works the study of film classes at universities throughout the world. The 1993 book Kie?lowski on Kie?lowski describes his life and work in his own words, based on interviews by Danusia Stok. He is also the subject of a biographical film, Krzysztof Kie?lowski: I'm So-So (1995), directed by Krzysztof Wierzbicki.

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1993 - 1995

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Though he had claimed to be retiring after Three Colors, at the time of his death Kie?lowski was working on a new trilogy co-written with Piesiewicz, consisting of Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory and inspired by Dante's La commedia. As was originally intended for the Decalogue, the scripts were ostensibly intended to be given to other directors for filming, but Kie?lowski's untimely death means it is unknown whether he might have broken his self-imposed retirement to direct the trilogy himself. The only completed screenplay, Heaven, was filmed by Tom Tykwer and released in 2002 at the Toronto International Film Festival. The other two scripts existed only as thirty-page treatments at the time of Kie?lowski's death; Piesiewicz has since completed these screenplays, with Hell?directed by Bosnian director Danis Tanovi? and starring Emmanuelle Béart?being released in 2005.

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Dante - La commedia - Heaven - Tom Tykwer - 2002 - Toronto International Film Festival - Danis Tanovi? - Emmanuelle Béart - 2005

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The Polish actor-director Jerzy Stuhr, who starred in several Kie?lowski films and co-wrote the script for Camera Buff, filmed his own adaptation of an unfilmed Kie?lowski script as Big Animal (Du?e zwierz?) in 2000.

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