
Witold Leszczyński
Directing
Biography
Witold Leszczyński (16 August 1933 – 1 September 2007) was a Polish film director and screenwriter. In 1967 he graduated from the National Film School in Łódź. He directed over thirty films between 1959 and 2007. Most known for Żywot Mateusza (Matthew's Days) based on a novel by Norwegian writer Tarjei Vesaas, Konopielka, adapted from the novel of Edward Redliński, Siekierezada based on a novel by Edward Stachura and many others films. He received numerous awards, including Grand Prix at the Polish Film Festival in 1986. The director died during the shoot of his film Stary człowiek i pies (The Old Man and the Dog) in 2007.
Known For

Bartłomiej, community elder and orator, must choose an appropriate successor, but finds difficulty in the aftermath of a local girl's tragic hit-and-run death. A community's pain reverberates through fractured relationships and the burden of funereal responsibility.
Requiem

Kaziuk, a stubborn peasant and his pregnant wife live in a backwood village, unaffected by the civilization. The village is once visited by a couple of wanderers, and strange things start to happen afterward. A new schoolteacher is sent to the area. She stirs erotic fantasies in Kaziuk. In a stir of frustration Kaziuk cuts down a family tree - a sacrilegious act in the eyes of his family. Going a step further and using a scythe for cutting the rye instead of a sickle brings the whole village against him.
The Linnet

A couple plans to spend a New Years Eve in a friend's empty apartment.
New Year's Eve Adventure

The mysterious Mr. Steinmetz has acquired the ability to create things and beings by will alone. Only, after a while his creations invariably disappear. He therefore approaches a famous brain surgeon, Max Holst, who he hopes can help him with this problem. When Max refuses, Steinmetz brings his doppelgänger into being to replace him.
The Man Who Thought Life

Two women trying to smuggle western goods back to Poland have only a few hours to convince a dedicated customs officer to take a bribe and let them pass.
Personal Search

A man who is socially inept and out of touch with the world lives with his sister in a small farmhouse. The overly sensitive man lives off his hard-working sibling, taking odd jobs as he gets them to secure his meager earnings. When he brings home a woodcutter from the forest, the sister and the newcomer fall in love. Terrified over a life without his sister, the man can't cope.
Matthew's Days

Two artists conduct philosophical disputes about practicing art.
Rekolekcje

A young, idealistic poet, turns his back on civilization and goes to small, backwood village, rents a bed in the house of an old woman, and decides to make his living as a lumberjack. Soon he realizes that the world around him is far from perfect.
Axiliad

A ruminative, understated drama on the nature of overwork versus an "unachieving" life away from the city, Pelnia examines the experience of one man. After leaving his high-pressured existence as a successful architect, the newly resolved dropout goes to live in a small community of cabins and summer homes in a lake-filled region north of Warsaw. His interactions with the villagers, including a drunkard and other eccentrics, provide an informative background for what happens next. The ex-architect's wife is a professional singer who has not abandoned the city or her life -- and she soon arrives to spend some time with her very changed husband.
Full Moon

A mysterious man visits a Masurian guesthouse after the season, where he develops a closer relationship with three female residents.
After Season
After returning to Poland, the painter Aleksander Gierymski encounters a lack of understanding of his works.
Mansarda

The film presents the story of Robert - an aging, once-recognized artist who is today struggling with his own complexes and vices, and helplessness towards a new reality that ruthlessly throws him to the margins of existence. One day Robert finds himself in a roadside ditch hit by a dog's car. In a reflex of spontaneous compassion, he takes the dog home and begins to look after him.
Stary człowiek i pies
A boy paralyzed as a child grows into an athletic man. The colossal strength that allowed him to become a fit man will prove to be his undoing. Convicted of a murder in a fight, he loses the chance to return to his beloved girl.
Colossus

A man dreams of stampeding horses, only to be awoken by a note slipped under his door. Thereafter, he embarks on a strange journey, moving further into the unknown.
Portrait of a Man with a Medallion
A young couple are driving a car. They are overtaken by another car. A game has thus started.