- Occupation
Director - Country
Poland
Zmarz-Koczanowicz Maria
I Love Poland
They are young and ideological. The members of All Polish Youth (APY) - an organization that descries itself as the ideological legate of the pre-war National Movement. What do they believe in? How strong are those beliefs? In "I Love Poland", the organization's members, who are already known to the public through mass media, show us a new face. The authors talk with them and accompany them to their meetings and actions, among them those which are aimed against the homosexuals and pro-European movements. They film the rapid development of the political careers of the organization representatives, who will become members of the Parliament and government.
Coal
It is a story of boys from Silesia who make their living picking coal along railroad tracks. Coal is the leitmotif of the tale. It is bread and butter, it gets you through another day, gives you a job and takes it away. Part of this narrative is another story, related to the mothers of boys who died on the track hit by a passing train.
My Warsaw
A personal view of Warsaw.
Gdanski Railway Station
"Gdanski Railway Station" is an attempt to deal with the painful period of Polish history - the year of 1968 and the anti-Semitic hysteria outburst that caused a massive exile of Polish citizens of Jewish descent.
Kazdy wie kto za kim stoi
The film shows a group of people who are crowding around a shop entrance. They almost crush each other in an attempt to obtain their daily food and other consumption goods. Life under the martial law.
The Office
A film about a bailiff's office, where people who are indebted to the state come to pay their dues. The filmmaker shows that the people are not always capable of paying their debts and that the officers are unyielding and merciless. Sometimes, people's houses are ruthlessly cleared out.
Vera Gran
Did a well-known cabaret singer from the Warsaw ghetto tarnish her reputation with the collaboration with the Gestapo? This question recedes into the background. The director, following Agata Tuszyńska, an author of Oskarżona: Wiera Gran, goes beyond the boundaries of a biographical picture or investigative documentary. Reconstructing the artist’s wartime and postwar life, the film touches upon the issue of moral judgment that is often too easy to make - both for those who have never experienced the hell of war and for those who did and need unambiguous assessment.
They are young and ideological. The members of All Polish Youth (APY) - an organization that descries itself as the ideological legate of the pre-war National Movement. What do they believe in? How strong are those beliefs? In "I Love Poland", the organization's members, who are already known to the public through mass media, show us a new face. The authors talk with them and accompany them to their meetings and actions, among them those which are aimed against the homosexuals and pro-European movements. They film the rapid development of the political careers of the organization representatives, who will become members of the Parliament and government.
Coal
It is a story of boys from Silesia who make their living picking coal along railroad tracks. Coal is the leitmotif of the tale. It is bread and butter, it gets you through another day, gives you a job and takes it away. Part of this narrative is another story, related to the mothers of boys who died on the track hit by a passing train.
My Warsaw
A personal view of Warsaw.
Gdanski Railway Station
"Gdanski Railway Station" is an attempt to deal with the painful period of Polish history - the year of 1968 and the anti-Semitic hysteria outburst that caused a massive exile of Polish citizens of Jewish descent.
Kazdy wie kto za kim stoi
The film shows a group of people who are crowding around a shop entrance. They almost crush each other in an attempt to obtain their daily food and other consumption goods. Life under the martial law.
The Office
A film about a bailiff's office, where people who are indebted to the state come to pay their dues. The filmmaker shows that the people are not always capable of paying their debts and that the officers are unyielding and merciless. Sometimes, people's houses are ruthlessly cleared out.
Vera Gran
Did a well-known cabaret singer from the Warsaw ghetto tarnish her reputation with the collaboration with the Gestapo? This question recedes into the background. The director, following Agata Tuszyńska, an author of Oskarżona: Wiera Gran, goes beyond the boundaries of a biographical picture or investigative documentary. Reconstructing the artist’s wartime and postwar life, the film touches upon the issue of moral judgment that is often too easy to make - both for those who have never experienced the hell of war and for those who did and need unambiguous assessment.
Visual artist and film director Maria Zmarz-Koczanowicz was born in 1954. In 1978, she obtained a degree in painting from the Academy of Fine Arts in Wroclaw and followed this up with a directing degree from the Radio and Television Department of the University of Silesia in Katowice, which she received in 1982. She then spent one year studying scenery design in Warsaw. In 1999 Zmarz-Koczanowicz taught for two semesters at the University of Buffalo (Media Studies). Documentary films are her focus, though her credits also include television theatre productions and one feature film. Selected filmography: Everyone Knows Who's Behind Who; I Am a Man; Major, or The Revolt of the Dwarves; Life Forgives Everything; I Don't Believe Politicians; Children of the Revolution; Generation 89; Turn Me into a Long Snake; Love for Vinyls; A Night with the General; I, the Construction Worker.