Zbigniew Preisner is Poland’s leading composer of film music; indeed, he is one of the most outstanding composers of his generation. He has worked with internationally recognized directors, however, his name is inseparable from that of director Krzystof Kieslowski. They worked together for years and the product of this co-operation were the films and music which made both internationally renowned.

Preisner is known as a melodist and a musical poet. A great inner peace often emanates from his music, the result of the fundamental meditative tone and the dark timbre he prefers. An opulent counterpart to the predominantly quiet tones of his music is found in the "Song For The Unification Of Europe", which begins and ends the film "Three Colours: Blue". Musical authenticity is actually felt here in his creative mastery because the cold calculation of deliberate emotional influencing found in so many Hollywood symphonies is lacking in Preisner’s melodics. His music is marked by a tonal uniqueness and originality above and beyond the usual "sound designs".

Zbigniew Preisner has received numerous awards and prizes. In three successive years he was proclaimed outstanding film music composer of the year by the L.A. Association.

Filmography (Excerpt):

1991		The Double Life of Veronique (L.A. Critics Association)
1992		Damage (L.A. Critics Association)
1993		Three Colors: Blue (L.A. Critics Association)
1993		Three Colours: White
1994		Three Colours: Red (César)
1995		Élisa (César)
1998		The Last September
2000		Aberdeen
2002		It’s all about Love
2003		Supertex
2004		Beautiful Country

Lothar Prox - Talk on Zbigniew Preisner



Lothar Prox was born in 1934 and studied music in Amsterdam. He showed an early interest in the theoretical and practical aspects of the audio-visual. His leading the Cologne film forum permitted him contact to practical work. In the 1980s he was appointed professor for media aesthetics at the Robert-Schumann College in Düsseldorf.

Lothar Prox has done much work here and abroad to draw attention to the special function and the historical achievements of the audio-visual media. In 1995 he initiated the International Film Music Biannial, which pays tribute to outstanding composers and promotes new young European talent.

After his talks on Edward Artemiev in 2002 and on Antoine Duhamel in 2003 Lothar Prox will give us insights into the work of the Polish film music composer Zbigniew Preisner at this year’s 18. International Film Festival.




Beautiful Country
D: Hans Petter Moland, N/USA 2004, 125 min, 35 mm, colour, GS



Binh is Vietnamese – but only half. The other half is American; his father was a GI in the War of Vietnam. In Vietnam the products of such unions are known as "less than dust". When Binh once more is excluded from the ceremonies commemorating the Vietcong's victory, he decides he will find his true parents. A long journey lies before him.




Supertex – An Hour in Paradise
D: Jan Schütte, D/NL 2003, 95 Min, 35 mm, colour, OV



Max Breslauer, heir to the Amsterdam textile empire "Supertex", has arranged his life quite comfortably. Wealthy, robust and cynical, he shows off with his Porsche, his psychiatrist and a beautiful married girlfriend. But storm clouds soon draw up and threaten Max’ easy life. His girl-friend informs him she wishes to live in Israel. Then when a serious accident happens to his father and his younger brother marries into an Orthodox Jewish family, Max is compelled to confront his Jewish roots.




Aberdeen
D: Hans Petter Moland, N/GB 2000, 113 min, 35 mm, colour, GS



The champagne is flowing abundantly at Kaisa’s party. Her London lawyer’s office has promoted her and she is enjoying the attention from her firm. When the telephone rings on the day after the party, things do not look so good. Her mother has cancer and asks Kaisa to find her alcoholic father Thomas in Oslo and to bring him to her sickbed in Aberdeen. Kaisa has not seen her father in ten years and when she faces him in Oslo he far exceeds her worst expectations.




It’s All About Love
D: Thomas Vinterberg, DK 2002, 104 min, 35 mm, colour, GV



During a stop-over in New York John visits his wife Elena, who has been living separated from him for years. He wants her to sign the divorce papers. Elena, a famous iceskater, is surrounded by a group of shadowy managers, advisers and their followers. But Elena’s career is nearing its end. But then three clones of Elena turn up on that snowy summer day in 2001 and a strange epidemic that causes fatal heart attacks in lonely people, and the humans in Uganda begin to fly.




Elisa
D: Jean Becker, F 1995, 115 min, 35 mm, colour, GV



Marie, Solange and Ahmed are street children. They live for the day, commit petty thefts and still appear to be innocent. However, carefree as they may seem to be, they aren’t. Marie in particular suffers from a trauma: her mother committed suicide and Marie blames her father, who left them years before. A postcard and a couple of musical notes put her on his trail. She sets out to avenge her mother’s death.




The Double Life of Veronica
D: Krzysztof Kieslowski, F/PL/D 1991, 92 min, 35 mm, colour, GV



Veronika, a twenty-year-old Pole, one day discovers her doppelgänger in a group of French tourists. Véronique and Veronika not only resemble each other in their outward appearance. Both are musically gifted to a high degree, both have lovely voices, both have problems with men and both have problems with their hearts. Veronika wins a song competition but collapses during her first solo number. Véronique’s life goes on; however, there is an increasing number of signs that Veronika’s soul has entered her body.




Three Colours: Blue (Trois Couleurs: Bleu)
D: Krzysztof Kieslowski, F/PL 1993, 98 min, 35 mm, colour, GV



This is the first part of Krzysztof Kielowski’s trilogy, which deals with the three catchwords of the French Revolution. After the sudden death of her family a woman retires from active life, breaks with her past and wants to leave all her memories behind. But life gets a hold on her again, in the form of a stubborn admirer and the sudden appearance of her late husband’s mistress. After a painful inner struggle she finds her freedom and a future through music.




Damage
D: Louis Malle, F/GB 1992, 111 min, 35 mm, colour, GV



A fifty-year-old English politician falls in love with his son’s girl-friend. He begins an affair with her which she actively encourages. She hopes thus to free herself from a trauma of her youth: namely the suicide when she was fifteen of her brother. However, this renewed "amour fou" leads to a catastrophe in the family and to the disintegration of the social ties of the man. Louis Malle describes the difficult balancing act between desire and common sense and bids for the understanding of suppressed obsessions and fantasies.




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