Film and theatre director, actor and screenwriter whose films were awarded in Berlin, Locarno, Venice, Karlovy Vary (not to mention the Academy Awards), Menzel will receive the award during the Closing Ceremony of TIFF, which will take place on June 8. On this occasion, an exhibition of posters of his films, part of the unique Terry Posters collection in Prague, will open at the Art Museum in Cluj.
"A master of human comedy" as celebrated American film critic Rogert Ebert used to call him, Jiří Menzel was born in 1938 in Prague and graduated from the famous FAMU film school in 1962. Together with Miloš Forman and Věra Chytilová, Menzel is one of the filmmakers associated with the so-called "New Wave in Czech Cinema". His short film, Mr. Balthazar's Death, was included in the film manifest of the New Wave, Pearls of the Deep, which received the FIPRESCI award in Locarno 1965.
At 28, two years before Prague Spring (1968), Jiří Menzel became one of the most fêted European directors, winning the Oscar for Best Foreign Film with Closely Watched Trains/ Ostře sledované vlaky, one of his six films based on stories by famed Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal. In an isolated Czech train station, during the Occupation, a freshly hired young employee has only one care: to lose his virginity as soon as possible. The film earned an impressive number of awards and offered Menzel the chance to leave Czechoslovakia. However, the director stayed on and went to direct over 20 multiple-awarded films.
In 1968, he received the Grand Prize in Karlovy Vary for Capricious Summer/ Rozmarné léto, and one year later, in 1969, he finished Larks on a String/ Skřivánci na niti, a film whose premiere was postponed by the censorship for two decades; in 1990, the film, also based on a Hrabal's work, received the Golden Bear and the FIPRESCI award in Berlin.
TIFF audiences will celebrate the director with My Sweet Little Village/ Vesničko má středisková, one of the most beloved Czech comedies ever, also adapted from Bohumil Hrabal. In 1986, the film brought Menzel a second Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Film. The film makes the very amusing portrait of a small village community in 80's Czechoslovakia. The protagonists, Otik (János Bán) and Pavek (Marián Labuda) are tractor workers and simple folk – but when a state employee eyes the former's house as a perfect holiday cottage, our two heroes have no choice but to get involved in politics and bureaucracy.
Jiří Menzel went on to direct Cutting it Short/ Postřižiny (Special Mention, Venice 1981), The End of the Old Times/ Konec starých časů (Best Film – Los Angeles IFF 1990) and I Served the King of England (FIPRESCI Award – Berlin 2007). The director is now in post-production with his newest film, Don Juans/ Donšajni.
Menzel is a member of the American Film Academy, a founding member of the European Film Academy and the former head (1990-1992) of the FAMU directing department. Between 1991 and 1998, he was the head of Studio 89, a department of the famed production company Kratky Film. He is an international theatre director and an actor, appearing in over 40 productions. In 1996, President Vaclav Havel gave Jiří Menzel the Medal of Merit of the Czech Republic.
TIFF audiences will admire some of the posters made by Czech artists for his films, at the Art Museum in Cluj. The exhibition will run from May 18 until June 18. The 17 posters brought to Cluj are part of the unique Terry Posters collection in Prague (www.terry-posters.com). Three of them are contemporary creations and some of those made before 1990 have remained in only two or three copies, which raises their value to a few thousand Euros. The exhibition includes original film posters for Larks on a String, Closely Watched Trains or Capricious Summer.
The Czech Centre in Bucharest supports the presence of Jiří Menzel and the Czech Posters exhibition.
