venue
date
time
available
Atlantic, B
2025-05-09
20:30
Who was Moshe Waks really? A golden boy of cinema, cunning fraud or a man who constantly confused the illusion of film with reality?


Son of a poor Jewish blacksmith from Ukraine, he died in Italy as Prince Michael Waszyński, Hollywood producer and exiled Polish aristocrat. He made more than 50 films including cinema hits with Sophia Loren and Claudia Cardinale. However only one film was his true obsession -The Dybbuk – based on an old Jewish legend, the most important and mystical Yiddish film ever made, directed by Waszyński shortly before the the outbreak of the World War II.

To the American magazine “Variety” Waszyński once claimed to be fascinated with the downfall of great nations. The related imagery of pogroms and migration are the sights and images that Waszyński had so often witnessed in his life. It seems he had achieved almost everything he could possibly have wished, but something seemed to be stalking him, leaving him permanently restless. Waszyński kept searching for the lost print of his film The Dybbuk which held his early memories of the Jewish shtetl and his first love. What secrets did he keep hidden in this old masterpiece of Yiddish cinema?

duration:
82 min
country / year of production:
Poland, Germany / 2017
director:
Elwira Niewiera, Piotr Rosołowski
cinematography:
Piotr Rosołowski
production:
Film Art Production, Kundschafter Filmproduktion, Zero One Film
selected festivals and awards:
2017 – IFF Venice: Venezia Classici Award for the Best Documentary on Cinema, 2017 – IFF Minsk: Diplomas Award, 2017 – FF Trieste, 2018 - Millennium Docs Against Gravity IFF: Chopin's Nose Award ex aequo
tags:
history Polish films psychology biopic

Other movies with this tag history

POWERED BY VISA