Polish film director Roman Polanski is to be honoured with a lifetime achievement award by the European Film Academy.
Polanski, whose behaviour off set has gained as much attention as his movies, won renewed respect with his wartime drama 'The Pianist'. The film closely echoed the director's experiences as a child.
Born into a Polish Jewish family, Polanski spent much of his youth in Cracow. He was from a middle class household that celebrated both Christian and Jewish traditions. However, assimilation was not enough to avoid the storm that was brewing. Although several of the family's Christian contacts helped hide the young boy, Polanski's mother and sister perished in the death-camps. His father survived the ghetto and remarried after the war.
Polanski rejected the opportunity to film 'The Pianist' in Cracow, stating that the area of the wartime ghetto carried too many harsh memories. He ultimately filmed the picture in Warsaw and Berlin, and 'The Pianist' went on to win the Palme D'Or at Cannes in 2002. The film divided the critics, with many arguing that 'Chinatown' and 'Rosemary's Baby' remain the director's outstanding works. |