 |
| Roman Polanski .... "unique artist who has managed to translate turning points in his own life so creatively." Photo: Guy Ferrandis |
Now 80, Roman Polanski looks more like a man in his early sixties. His youthful demeanour may be partly explained by his becoming a father at 60. The mother of his 21-year-old daughter Morgane and 16-year-old son Elvis is actress Emannuelle Seigner, 48, whom he cast first in Tess, his 1979 version of Thomas Hardy's Tess Of The d'Urbervilles, and later in Bitter Moon, Frantic and most recently Venus In Fur.
The couple will be in attendance at the Locarno Film Festival, which starts next week and where Polanksi is guest of honour. He will give a talk on life and work at an event open to the public.
Polanski ‘s trademark has been an ability to master such a range of different styles, while always retaining a coherent vision of cinema, and he has had a powerful influence on younger generations of filmmakers.
Over the course of his career Roman Polanski has made many landmark films, among them Repulsion (1965) with Catherine Deneuve, Rosemary’s Baby (1968) with Mia Farrow, Chinatown (1974) with Jack Nicholson, The Pianist (2002, for which he won Best Director Oscar) with Adrian Brody, and Venus In Fur (2013) with Seigner.
Polanski will receive a special award, and conduct a masterclass with young filmmakers of the Locarno Summer Academy as well as addressing the public. The event is planned to take place on Friday 15 August.
 |
| Emmanuelle Seigner as she appeared in Venus in Fur under Roman Polanski's direction, and opposite Mathieu Amalric |
Along with Seigner, Roman Polanski will introduce the screening of Venus In Fur on Thursday 14 August on the Piazza Grande.
Carlo Chatrian, the Festival’s Artistic Director, said: “Roman Polanski’s films have been a regular feature of my trajectory as a filmgoer - making me laugh, shiver, think, and be emotionally moved. It has been an enormous pleasure to follow the work of this unique artist who has managed to translate turning points in his own life so creatively, and that of Emmanuelle Seigner, his wife and star of films that mean so much to me, such as Frantic, Bitter Moon and Essential Killing.
“Finally I am very proud of Polanski’s choice to support the education and training programme that the Festival organises. Cinema is also about passing on knowledge: we do not ask the masters to hand down lessons from on high but to share their experiences. I am sure that the opportunity to meet a filmmaker who resists all forms of dogmatism will prove to be one of the most exciting moments of the Festival.”
The last time Polanski headed to Switzerland, for an appearance at the Zurich Film Festival in 2009, he ended up being detained under house arrest at his chalet near Gstaad for ten months after the US authorities tried to have him extradited on a charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor dating back to 1977. He had fled the country before he was sentenced. Polanski, managed to complete The Ghost, based on a Robert Harris's best-seller, while under arrest in Switzerland.
Meanwhile film-maker Kleber Mendoça, who won the FIPRESCI Prize at Rotterdam and Wroclaw’s New Horizons for his fiction feature debut Neighbouring Sounds in 2012, will also be in Locarno as part of an almost 60-strong Brazilian delegation.
Mendoça, who is also the director of Recife’s Janela International Film Festival, will be joined by, among others, festival director colleagues Renata de Almeida and Ivan Melo of the Sao Paulo IFF as well as Manoel Rangel and Eduardo Valente of film funder ANCINE, André Sturm of Cinema do Brasil, producers Sara Silveira (Dezenove Som et Imagem), Eliane Ferreira (Muiraquita Filmes) and Elias Ribeiro (Urucu Media), distributors Jean-Thomas Bernardini (Imovision) and Marcos De Oliveira (Europa Filmes), and sales agent Sandro Fiorin (Figa Films).
The 67th edition of the Festival del film Locarno will take place from 6 to 16 August.
