Roman Polanski

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Roman Polanski is a Polish film director, producer, writer and actor. Having made films in Poland, Britain, France and the USA he is considered one of the few "truly international filmmakers. Roman Polanski's parents returned to Poland from France in 1936, three years before World War II began: on Germany's invasion in 1939 as a Jewish family they were all sent to the Krakow ghetto. His parents were then captured and sent to two different concentration camps, his father to Mauthausen-Gusen in Austria where he survived the war and his mother to Auschwitz where she was murdered. He witnessed his father's capture and then, at 7, managed to escape the ghetto and survive the war at first wandering through the Polish countryside pretending to be a Roman-Catholic visiting his relatives. Although this saved his life he was severely mistreated suffering a near fatal beating which left him with a fractured skull. Local people usually ignored the cinemas where German films were shown, but Polanski seemed little concerned by the propaganda and often went to the movies. As the war progressed Poland became increasingly war torn and he lived life as a tramp, hiding in barns and forests, eating whatever he could steal or find. Still under 12 years old he encountered some Nazi soldiers who forced him to hold targets while they shot at them. At the war's end in 1945, he was reunited with his father who sent him to technical school, but young Polanski seemed to have already chosen another career. In the 1950s, he took up acting, appearing in Andrzej Wajda's A Generation before studying at the Lodz Film School. His early shorts such as Dwaj ludzie z szafa, The Fat and the Lean, and Mammals showed his taste for black humor and interest in bizarre human relationships. His feature debut, Knife in the Water, was the first Polish post-war film not associated with the war theme. Though already a major Polish filmmaker Polanski chose to leave the country and headed to France. While down-and-out in Paris, he befriended young scriptwriter, Gérard Brach, who eventually became his long-time collaborator. The next two films, Repulsion and Cul-de-sac, made in England and co-written by Brach, won Silver and then Golden Bear awards at the Berlin Film Festivals. In 1968, Polanski went to Hollywood, where he made the psychological thriller Rosemary's Baby. However, after the brutal murder of his wife Sharon Tate by the infamous Manson gang in 1969, the director decided to return to Europe. In 1974, he again made a US release: Chinatown. It seemed the beginning of a promising Hollywood career, but after his conviction for the statutory rape of a 13-year old girl, Polanski fled from the USA to avoid prison. After Tess, which was awarded several Oscars and Cesars, his work became intermittent and rarely approached the caliber of his earlier films. He still likes to act in the films of other directors, sometimes with interesting results as in A Pure Formality. By: Yuri German (blsidt1 AT imf.org) and edited by Steve Somers  See full bio on IMDb »