Roman Polanski

"Polanski" redirects here. For other people with this name, see Polanski (surname).

Roman Polanski
Polanski in 2007
Born	Rajmund Roman Thierry Polański (1933-08-18) 18 August 1933 Paris, France
Citizenship	Franco-Polish
Occupation(s)	Actor, director, producer, screenwriter
Years active	1953–present
Criminal charge	Unlawful sexual intercourse
Criminal status	At large
Spouse(s)	Barbara Lass (1959–1962) Sharon Tate (1968–1969) Emmanuelle Seigner (1989–present)
Children	Daughter and son

Roman Polański (Polish pronunciation: [ˈrɔman pɔˈlaɲskʲi]; born 18 August 1933 as Rajmund Roman Thierry Polanski) is a Polish-French film director, producer, writer and actor. Having made films in countries such as Poland, Britain, America and France, he is considered one of the few "truly international filmmakers." His films cross national and political boundaries, and expose many of the "dark psychological desires" that are common among all people.

Born in Paris to Polish parents, he moved with his family back to Poland in 1937, shortly before the outbreak of World War II. He survived the Holocaust without his parents, who were forcibly taken to concentration camps for being Jewish. He was educated in Poland and became a director of both art house and commercial films. Polanski's first feature-length film, Knife in the Water (1962), made in Poland, was nominated for a United States Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. He has since received five more Oscar nominations, along with two Baftas, four Césars, a Golden Globe Award and the Palme d'Or of the Cannes Film Festival in France. In the United Kingdom he directed three films, beginning with Repulsion (1965). In 1968 he moved to the United States, and cemented his status by directing the Oscar winning horror film Rosemary's Baby (1968).

In 1969, Polanski's pregnant wife, Sharon Tate, was murdered while staying at the Polanskis' Benedict Canyon home above Los Angeles by members of the Manson Family. Following Tate's death, Polanski returned to Europe and spent much of his time in Paris and Gstaad, but did not direct another film until Macbeth (1971) in England. The following year he went to Italy to make What? (1973) and subsequently spent the next five years living near Rome. However, he traveled to Hollywood to direct Chinatown (1974). The film was nominated for eleven Academy Awards, and was a critical and box-office success. Polanski's next film, The Tenant (1976), was shot in France, and completed the "Apartment Trilogy", following Repulsion and Rosemary's Baby.

In 1977, after a photo shoot in Los Angeles, Polanski was arrested for the sexual abuse of a 13-year-old girl and pleaded guilty to the charge of unlawful sex with a minor. To avoid sentencing, Polanski fled to his home in London, and then moved on to France the following day. In September 2009, Polanski was arrested by Swiss police at the request of U.S. authorities who asked for his extradition. However, in July 2010, the Swiss rejected that request and instead released him from custody and declared him a "free man."

Polanski continued to make films such as The Pianist (2002), a World War II true story drama about a Jewish-Polish musician. The film won three Academy Awards including Best Director, along with numerous international awards. He also directed other films, including Oliver Twist (2005), a story which parallels his own life as a "young boy attempting to triumph over adversity. His most recent release is The Ghost Writer (2010), a fictionalized thriller loosely based on the life of former British prime minister Tony Blair. It swept the European Film Awards in 2010, winning six awards, including best movie, director, actor and screenplay.

Early life

Polanski was born as Rajmund Roman Thierry Polański in Paris, France, the son of Bula (née Katz-Przedborska) and Ryszard Polański (né Liebling), a painter and plastics manufacturer. His mother had a daughter, Annette, by her previous husband. Annette managed to survive Auschwitz, where her mother died, and left Poland forever for France. His father was Jewish and his Russian-born mother, Bula, had been raised Roman Catholic. Ryszard Liebling had changed his surname to Polański in early 1932.

World War II

The Polański family moved back to the Polish city of Kraków in 1936, and were living there when the World War II began with the invasion of Poland. Neither of Polanski's parents was religious. Kraków was soon occupied by the German forces. Nazi racial and religious purity laws made the Polańskis targets of persecution and forced them into the Kraków Ghetto, along with thousands of the city's Jews. He witnessed both the ghettoization of Krakow's Jews into a compact area of the city, and the subsequent deportation of all the ghetto's Jews to concentration camps, including watching as his father was taken away. He remembers from age 6, one of his first experiences of the terrors to follow:

I had just been visiting my grandmother . . . when I received a foretaste of things to come. At first I didn't know what was happening. I simply saw people scattering in all directions. Then I realized why the street had emptied so quickly. Some women were being herded along it by German soldiers. Instead of running away like the rest, I felt compelled to watch.

One older woman at the rear of the column couldn't keep up. A German officer kept prodding her back into line, but she fell down on all fours, . . . Suddenly a pistol appeared in the officer's hand. There was a loud bang, and blood came welling out of her back. I ran straight into the nearest building, squeezed into a smelly recess beneath some wooden stairs, and didn't come out for hours.

I developed a strange habit: clenching my fists so hard that my palms became permanently calloused. I also woke up one morning to find that I had wet my bed.

His father survived the Mauthausen-Gusen concentration camp in Austria, but his mother perished at Auschwitz. Polański escaped the Kraków Ghetto in 1943 and survived the war using the name Romek Wilk with the help of some Polish Roman Catholic families with whom he came into contact. As a Jewish child in hiding without parents, he lived with numerous different Catholic families, attended church, learned to recite most Catholic prayers by heart, and behaved outwardly as a Roman Catholic, although he was never baptized. However, his efforts to assimilate into Catholic households as a member of the family often failed. In one instance, the parish priest visited the family and began to interrogate him, as Polanski recalls:

"Who exactly are you?" he asked. "Where were you baptized?" . . . "What was the name of your parish priest?" . . . He pursued his inquisition to the bitter end. "You're a little liar," he said finally. "You've never been babtized at all." He took me by the ear and led me over to the mirror. "Look at yourself. Look at those eyes, that mouth, those ears. You aren't one of us."

Writer Mitchell Glazer describes Polanski's difficult childhood:

Truth and myth about Polanski merge in a grisly, Jerzy Kosinskiesque tale: at six, slipping through the Cracow sewers with gangs of Jewish children to steal food for their families; having his mother hauled away before his eyes to perish in Auschwitz; at seven, being hidden by various non-Jews (for a fee) and finally being sent to a Polish farm to live with a peasant family. The stories become even darker: near fatal beatings (he has a metal plate in his head), starvation, night escapes across the freezing Polish countryside. And all this before he was twelve.

As he roamed the countryside trying to survive in a Poland now occupied by German troops, he witnessed many horrors, such as being "forced to take part in a cruel and sadistic game in which German soldiers took shots at him for target practice." Author Ian Freer concludes that his constant childhood fears of dread and violence have contributed to the "tangible atmospheres he conjures up on film."

By the time the war ended in 1945, a fifth of the Polish population had been killed, with the vast majority of the victims being civilians. Of those deaths, 3 million were of Polish Jews, 90% of the country's Jewish population.

After the war

After the war he was reunited with his father, and moved back to Kraków. Eventually, his father remarried, but Polanski disliked his stepmother. He died of cancer in 1984. Polanski recalls the villages and families he lived with as relatively primitive by European standards:

They were really simple Catholic peasants. This Polish village was like the English village in Tess. Very primitive. No electricity. The kids with whom I lived didn't know about electricity. . . they wouldn't believe me when I told them it was enough to turn on a switch!

In hindsight, he states that "you must live in a Communist country to really understand how bad it can be. Then you will appreciate capitalism." He does, however, remember events at the war's end and his reintroduction to mainstream society when he was 12, forming friendships with other children, such as Richard Horowitz and his family:

Richard was one of the very few children to have survived deportation from the Krakow ghetto and the only one to have survived the transit camp that followed. His father had hidden him in a latrine cesspool, neck-deep, while the other children were being rounded up for liquidation. . . Regina Horowitz was a typical Jewish mother, warm, resilient, and vital—a tower of strength. She always lit candles on Friday nights, and for the first time in my life I found myself in a household where Jewish rites were observed.

Introduction to movies

Occasionally, he was able to watch films, either at school or at a local cinema, using whatever pocket money he had. Polanski writes, "Most of this went on the movies, but movie seats were dirt cheap, so a little went a long way. I lapped up every kind of film." As time went on, movies became more than an escape into entertainment, as he explains:

Movies were becoming an absolute obsession with me. I was enthralled by everything connected with the cinema— not just the movies themselves but the aura that surrounded them. I loved the luminous rectangle of the screen, the sight of the beam slicing through the darkness from the projection booth, the miraculous synchronization of sound and vision, even the dusty smell of the tip-up seats. More than anything else, though I was fascinated by the actual mechanics of the process.

Career

Polanski's star on the Łódź walk of fame

Polanski attended the National Film School in Łódź, the third-largest city in Poland. In the 1950s Polanski took up acting, appearing in Andrzej Wajda's Pokolenie (A Generation, 1954) and in the same year in Silik Sternfeld's Zaczarowany rower (Enchanted Bicycle or Magical Bicycle). Polanski's directorial debut was also in 1955 with a short film Rower (Bicycle). Rower is a semi-autobiographical feature film, believed to be lost, which also starred Polanski. It refers to his real-life violent altercation with a notorious Kraków felon, Janusz Dziuba, who arranged to sell Polanski a bicycle, but instead beat him badly and stole his money. In real life the offender was arrested while fleeing after fracturing Polanski's skull, and executed for three murders, out of eight prior such assaults, which he had committed. Several other short films made during his study at Łódź gained him considerable recognition, particularly Two Men and a Wardrobe (1958) and When Angels Fall (1959). He graduated in 1959.

Polanski's first feature-length film, Knife in the Water (1962), was also the first significant Polish film after WWII that did not have a war theme. Scripted by Jerzy Skolimowski, Jakub Goldberg and Polanski, Knife in the Water is about a wealthy, unhappily married couple who decide to take a mysterious hitchhiker with them on a weekend boating excursion. A dark and unsettling work, Polanski's debut feature subtly evinces a profound pessimism about human relationships with regard to the psychological dynamics and moral consequences of status envy and sexual jealousy. Knife in the Water was a major commercial success in the West and gave Polanski an international reputation. The film also earned its director his first Academy Award nomination (Best Foreign Language Film, 1963).

Despite his reputation as a major Polish filmmaker, Polanski left then-communist Poland and moved to France, where he had already made two notable short films in 1961: The Fat and the Lean and Mammals. While in France, Polanski contributed one segment ("La rivière de diamants") to the French-produced omnibus film, Les plus belles escroqueries du monde (English title: The Beautiful Swindlers) in 1964. However, Polanski found that in the early 1960s the French film industry was generally unwilling to support a rising filmmaker whom they viewed as a cultural Pole and not a Frenchman.

Film director

Repulsion (1965)

Polanski made three feature films in England, based on original scripts written by himself and Gérard Brach, a frequent collaborator. Repulsion (1965) is a psychological horror film focusing on a young Belgian woman named Carol (Catherine Deneuve), who is living in London with her older sister (Yvonne Furneaux). The film's themes, situations, visual motifs, and effects clearly reflect the influence of early surrealist cinema as well as horror movies of the 1950s – particularly Luis Buñuel's Un chien Andalou, Jean Cocteau's The Blood of a Poet, Henri-Georges Clouzot's Diabolique and Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho.

Cul-de-sac (1966)

Cul-de-sac (1966) is a bleak nihilist tragicomedy filmed on location in Northumberland. The general tone and the basic premise of the film owes a great deal to Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, along with aspects of Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party.

The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967)

The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967) is a parody of vampire films. The plot concerns a buffoonish professor and his clumsy assistant, Alfred (played by Polanski), who are traveling through Transylvania in search of vampires. The ironic and macabre ending is considered classic Polanski. The Fearless Vampire Killers was Polanski's first feature to be photographed in color with the use of Panavision lenses, and included a striking visual style with snow-covered, fairy-tale landscapes, similar to the work of Soviet fantasy filmmakers. In addition, the richly textured color schemes of the settings evoke the magical, kaleidoscopic paintings of the great Russian-Jewish artist Marc Chagall, who provides the namesake for the innkeeper in the film.

Polanski met Sharon Tate while the film was being made, where she played the role of the local innkeeper's daughter. They were married in London on 20 January 1968.

Films in America

Rosemary's Baby (1968)

Polanski first read the novel Rosemary's Baby non-stop through the night and the following morning decided he wanted to write as well as direct it. The film, Rosemary's Baby (1968), was a box-office success and became his first Hollywood production, thereby establishing his reputation as a major commercial filmmaker. The film, a horror-thriller set in trendy Manhattan, is about Rosemary Woodhouse (Mia Farrow), a young housewife who is impregnated by the devil. Polanski's screenplay adaptation earned him a second Academy Award nomination.

Chinatown (1973)

After making his next two films in Europe, Polanski returned to Hollywood in 1973 to direct Chinatown for Paramount Pictures. The film was nominated for 11 Academy Awards. The stars, Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway, both received Oscar nominations for their roles, and the script by Robert Towne won for Best Original Screenplay. Polanski appears in a cameo role.

Films in Europe

On 9 August 1969, while Polanski was working in London, his wife, Sharon Tate, and four other people were murdered at the Polanskis' residence in Los Angeles. Polanski abandoned his project and did not resume working until the production of Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Macbeth (1971). Jon Finch and Francesca Annis appeared in the lead roles. He adapted Shakespeare's original text into a screenplay with the British theater critic Kenneth Tynan. In his autobiography Polanski wrote that he wanted to be true to the violent nature of the work, and that he had been aware that his first project following Tate's murder, would be subject to scrutiny and probable cricitism regardless of the subject matter; if he had made a comedy he would have been perceived as callous.

What? (1973)

Written by Polanski and previous collaborator Gérard Brach, What? (1973) is a mordant absurdist comedy loosely based on the themes of Alice in Wonderland and Henry James. The film is a rambling shaggy dog story about the sexual indignities that befall a winsome young American hippie woman hitchhiking through Europe.

The Tenant (1976)

After filming Chinatown (1974) in Los Angeles, Polanski returned to Paris for his next film, The Tenant (1976), which was based on a 1964 novel by Roland Topor, a French writer of Polish-Jewish origin. In addition to directing the film, Polanski also played a leading role of a timid Polish immigrant living in Paris. together with his two earlier works, The Tenant can be seen as the third installment in a loose trilogy of films called the "Apartment Trilogy" that explore the themes of social alienation and psychic and emotional breakdown. In his autobiography, Polanski wrote: "I had a great admiration for American institutions and regarded the United States as the only truly democratic country in the world."

Tess (1979)

He dedicated his next film, Tess (1979), to the memory of his late wife, Sharon Tate. It was Tate who suggested to Polanski that he read it, as she felt it might make a good film. Tess was Polanski's first film since his 1977 arrest in Los Angeles, and because of the American-British extradition treaty, Tess was shot in the north of France instead of Hardy's England. Nastassja Kinski appeared in the title role opposite Peter Firth and Leigh Lawson. The film became the most expensive made in France up to that time. Ultimately, Tess proved a financial success and was well-received by both critics and the public. For Tess, Polanski won France's César Awards for Best Picture and Best Director and received his fourth Academy Award nomination (and his second nomination for Best Director). The film received three Oscars: best cinematography, best art direction and best costume design. In addition, Tess was nominated for best picture.

Polanski at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival for The Pianist

Nearly seven years passed before Polanski completed his next film, Pirates (1986), a lavish period piece starring Walter Matthau, which the director intended as an homage to the beloved Errol Flynn swashbucklers of his childhood. Pirates was followed by Frantic (1988), a suspenseful thriller starring Harrison Ford and the actress/model, his future wife Emmanuelle Seigner. She would go on to star in two more of his films, Bitter Moon (1992), The Ninth Gate (1999) and Death and the Maiden (1994).

In 1997, Polanski directed a stage version of his 1967 film The Fearless Vampire Killers, which debuted in Vienna followed by successful runs in Stuttgart, Hamburg, Berlin, and Budapest. On 11 March 1998, Polanski was elected a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts.

Polanski with wife Emmanuelle Seigner at the Cannes Film Festival

The Pianist (2002)

In 2002, Polanski's production company, R.P. Productions, released The Pianist, an adaptation of the World War II autobiography of the same name by Polish-Jewish musician Władysław Szpilman. Szpilman's experiences as a persecuted Jew in Poland during WWII were reminiscent of Polanski and his family. While the fates of Szpilman and Polanski were to escape incarceration in any of the concentration camps, their family members did not, eventually perishing while captive during the course of the war.

In May 2002, the film won the Palme d'Or (Golden Palm) award at the Cannes Film Festival, as well as Césars for Best Film and Best Director, and later the 2002 Academy Award for Directing. Because he would have been arrested once in the United States, Polanski did not attend the Academy Awards ceremony in Hollywood. After the announcement of the Best Director Award, Polanski received a standing ovation from most of those present in the theater. He later received the Crystal Globe award for outstanding artistic contribution to world cinema at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in 2004.

The Ghost Writer (2010)

The Ghost Writer, a thriller loosely based on an episode in the life of former British prime minister Tony Blair, swept the European Film Awards in 2010, winning six awards, including best movie, director, actor and screenplay. When it premiered at the 60th Berlinale in February 2010, Polanski won a Silver Bear for Best Director. The cast includes Ewan McGregor as the writer and Pierce Brosnan as prime minister Adam Lang. The film was shot on locations in Germany.

In the U.S., film critic Roger Ebert included it in his top 10 pick for 2010, and states that "this movie is the work of a man who knows how to direct a thriller. Smooth, calm, confident, it builds suspense instead of depending on shock and action. " Co-star Ewan McGregor agrees, saying about Polanski that "he's a legend. . . I've never examined a director and the way that they work, so much before. He's brilliant, just brilliant, and absolutely warrants his reputation as a great director."

Personal life

File:Polanski-Tate-promo.jpg

With Sharon Tate, circa 1969

Marriages and relationships

Barbara Lass

Polanski's first wife, Barbara Lass (née Kwiatkowska), was a Polish actress who also starred in Polanski's 1959 When Angels Fall. The couple were married in 1959 and divorced in 1961.

Sharon Tate

He met rising actress Sharon Tate while filming The Fearless Vampire Killers, and during the production the two of them began dating. On 20 January 1968, Polanski married Tate in London. In his autobiography, Polanski described his brief time with Tate as the best years of his life.

Charles Manson murders

She died a year and a half after they were married as one of the victims of the Manson murders, in August 1969. In December of that year, Charles Manson and several members of his "family" were arrested, tried, and found guilty of first-degree murder of Tate and three friends at Polanki's home. Polanski has said that his absence on the night of the murders is the greatest regret of his life. In his autobiography, he wrote, "Sharon's death is the only watershed in my life that really matters", and commented that her murder changed his personality from a "boundless, untroubled sea of expectations and optimism" to one of "ingrained pessimism ... eternal dissatisfaction with life".

Nastassja Kinski

In 1976, Polanski started a romantic relationship with Nastassja Kinski, who starred in Tess. She was between 15 and 17 years old, and he was 43. Their relationship ended at the completion of filming. In an interview with David Letterman in 1982, she described their relationship and gave her opinion about his sexual assault case, claiming it was "ridiculous" and his remaining in France was "a loss for America."

Emmanuelle Seigner

In 1989, Polanski married French actress Emmanuelle Seigner. They have two children, daughter Morgane and son Elvis. Polanski and his children speak Polish at home.

Sexual assault case

Main article: Roman Polanski sexual abuse case

On 11 March 1977, Polanski, then 43 years old, was arrested for the sexual assault of 13-year-old Samantha Geimer during a photo shoot for French Vogue magazine. Soon after he was indicted on six counts of criminal behavior, including rape. At his arraignment Polanski pled not guilty to all charges.

Geimer's attorney next arranged a plea bargain, which Polanski accepted, where five of the six charges would be dismissed. Polanski then pled guilty to the charge of "Unlawful Sexual Intercourse," with a minor, a charge equivalent to statutory rape in California. Polanski was then ordered to undergo 90-days of psychiatric evaluation at Chino State Prison.

On release from prison, Polanski expected that at final sentencing he would be put on probation. However, the judge had apparently changed his mind in the interim and now "suggested to Polanski's attorneys" that more jail time and possible deportation were in order. Upon learning of the judge's plans Polanski fled to France on February 1, 1978, just hours before sentencing by the judge. As a French citizen, he has been protected from extradition and has lived mostly in France since then.

On 26 September 2009, Polanski was arrested while in Switzerland at the request of U.S. authorities. He was kept under house arrest at his home in Gstaad while awaiting decision of appeals fighting extradition to the U.S. On July 12, 2010, however, the Swiss rejected the U.S. request and instead declared him a "free man" and released him from custody, although all six of the original charges still remain pending in the U.S.

Documentary film

In 2008 the documentary film, Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, was released in Europe and the U.S. where it won numerous awards. The film focuses on the judge in the case and the possible reasons why he changed his mind. It includes interviews with those involved in the case, including the victim, Geimer, who commented about the judge:

"He didn't care what happened to me, and he didn't care what happened to Polanski. He was orchestrating some little show . . . "

In another interview, the prosecuting attorney, Roger Gunson, states "I'm not surprised that Polanski left under those circumstances."

Vanity Fair libel case

In 2004, Polanski sued Vanity Fair magazine in London for libel. A 2002 article in the magazine claimed that Polanski made sexual advances towards a young model while traveling to Tate's funeral. The trial included testimony of actress Mia Farrow and others, and it was concluded from the evidence that the event could not have happened, and Polanski was awarded £50,000 in damages by the High Court in London.

Filmography

Director

Year	Film	Oscar nominations	Oscar wins
1955	Zaczarowany rower (also as Bicycle)
1957	Morderstwo (also as A Murderer)
	Uśmiech zębiczny (also as A Toothful Smile)
	Rozbijemy zabawę (also as Break Up the Dance)
1958	Dwaj ludzie z szafą (also as Two Men and a Wardrobe)
1959	Lampa (also as The Lamp)
	Gdy spadają anioły (also as When Angels Fall)
1961	Le Gros et le maigre (also as The Fat and the Lean)
	Ssaki (also as Mammals)
1962	Nóż w wodzie (also as Knife in the Water)	1
1964	Les plus belles escroqueries du monde (also as The Beautiful Swindlers)—segment: "La rivière de diamants"
1965	Repulsion*
1966	Cul-de-sac
1967	The Fearless Vampire Killers or: Pardon Me, Madam, but Your Teeth Are in My Neck (also as Dance of the Vampires)
1968	Rosemary's Baby*	2	1
1971	The Tragedy of Macbeth
1973	What? (also as Diary of Forbidden Dreams)
1974	Chinatown	11	1
1976	Le Locataire (also as The Tenant)*
1979	Tess	6	3
1986	Pirates	1
1988	Frantic
1992	Bitter Moon
1994	Death and the Maiden
1999	The Ninth Gate
2002	The Pianist	7	3
2005	Oliver Twist
2007	To Each His Own Cinema (segment Cinéma erotique)
2010	The Ghost Writer

*These movies are part of his 'Apartment Trilogy'.

Actor

This list contains both cameos and more major roles.

• Trzy opowieści (aka Three Stories) as Genek 'The Little' (segment "Jacek", 1953)
• Zaczarowany rower (aka Magical Bicycle) as Adas (1955)
• Rower (aka Bicycle) as the Boy who wants to buy a bicycle (1955)
• Pokolenie (aka A Generation) as Mundek (1955)
• Nikodem Dyzma as the Boy at Hotel (1956)
• Wraki (aka The Wrecks, 1957)
• Koniec nocy (aka End of the Night) as the Little One (1957)
• Dwaj ludzie z szafą (aka Two Men and a Wardrobe) as the Bad boy (1958)
• Zadzwońcie do mojej żony? (aka Call My Wife) as a Dancer (1958)
• Gdy spadają anioły (aka When Angels Fall Down) as an Old woman (1959)
• Lotna as a Musician (1959)
• Zezowate szczęście (aka Bad Luck) as Jola's Tutor (1960)
• Do widzenia, do jutra (aka Good Bye, Till Tomorrow) as Romek (1960)
• Niewinni czarodzieje (aka Innocent Sorcerers) as Dudzio (1960)
• Ostrożnie, Yeti! (aka Beware of Yeti!, 1961)
• Gros et le maigre, Le (aka The Fat and the Lean) as The Lean (1961)
• Samson (1961)
• Nóż w wodzie (aka Knife in the Water) voice of Young Boy (1962)
• Repulsion as Spoon Player (1965)
• The Fearless Vampire Killers as Alfred, Abronsius' Assistant (1967)
• The Magic Christian as Solitary drinker (1969)
• What? as Mosquito (1972)
• Chinatown as Man with Knife (1974)
• Blood for Dracula (Andy Warhol) as Man in Tavern (1976)
• Locataire, Le (aka The Tenant) as Trelkovsky (1976)
• Chassé-croisé (1982)
• En attendant Godot (TV) as Lucky (1989)
• Back in the USSR as Kurilov (1992)
• Una pura formalità (aka A Pure Formality) as Inspector (1994)
• Grosse fatigue (aka Dead Tired) as Roman Polanski (1994)
• Hommage à Alfred (aka Tribute to Alfred Lepetit, 2000)
• Zemsta (aka The Revenge) as Papkin (2002)
• Rush Hour 3 as Detective Revi (2007)
• Caos Calmo as Steiner (2007)

Writer

• Script for A Day at the Beach (1970) based on the 1962 novel of the same name by Simon Heere Heeresma.
• Polanski's autobiography, Roman by Polanski, sometimes known as Roman.

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Result
1963	Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences	Best Foreign Language Film (Knife in the Water)	Nominated
1965	Berlin Film Festival	Silver Berlin Bear-Extraordinary Jury Prize (Repulsion)	Won
1966	Berlin Film Festival	Golden Bear (Cul-de-sac)	Won
1968	Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences	Best screenplay adaptation (Rosemary's Baby)	Nominated
1974	Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences	Academy Award for Best Director (Chinatown)	Nominated
1974	Golden Globe Awards	Golden Globe Award for Best Director - Motion Picture (Chinatown)	Won
1974	British Academy of Film and Television Arts	Best Direction (Chinatown)	Won
1979	César Awards	César Award for Best Picture (Tess)	Won
1979	César Awards	César Award for Best Director (Tess)	Won
1979	Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences	Academy Award for Directing (Tess)	Nominated
1979	Golden Globe Awards	Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Film (Tess)	Won
1979	Golden Globe Awards	Golden Globe Award for Best Director—Motion Picture (Tess)	Nominated
2002	British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA)	Best Film; Best Director (The Pianist)	Won
2002	Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences	Academy Award for Best Director (The Pianist)	Won
2002	Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma	Cesar Award for Best Director (The Pianist)	Won
2002	Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma	César Award for Best Film (The Pianist)	Won
2002	Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma	Cesar Award for Best Director (The Pianist)	Won
2004	Karlovy Vary International Film Festival	Crystal Globe for outstanding artistic contribution to world cinema	Won
2009	Zurich Film Festival Golden Icon Award	Lifetime achievement	Won
2010	Berlin Film Festival	Silver Bear for Best Director (The Ghost Writer)	Won
2010	European Film Awards	Best Film; Best Director; Best Screenwriter (The Ghost Writer)	Won

Other awards

New York Film Critics Circle Awards

• 1980 Tess nominated for Best Direction
• 1980 Tess nominated for Best Foreign Film
• 1974 Chinatown nominated for Best Film
• 1971 Macbeth nominated for Best Direction
• 1971 Macbeth nominated for Best Film
• 1965 Repulsion nominated for Best Direction
• 1965 Repulsion nominated for Best Screenwriting

Venice Film Festival

• 1966 Cul De Sac nominated for National Syndication of Italian Film Journalists
• 1962 Knife in the Water won for Fipresci Prize

References

Bibliography

• Bugliosi, Vincent, with Gentry, Kurt, (1974) Helter Skelter, The Shocking Story of the Manson Murders, Arrow, London. ISBN 0099975009
• Cronin, Paul (2005) Roman Polanski: Interviews, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi. 200p
• Farrow, Mia (1997). What Falls Away: A Memoir, New York: Bantam.
• Feeney, F.X. (text); Duncan, Paul (visual design). (2006). Roman Polanski, Koln: Taschen. ISBN 3-8228-2542-5
• Jacke, Andreas (2010): Roman Polanski—Traumatische Seelenlandschaften, Gießen: Psychosozial-Verlag. ISBN 9783837920376, ISBN 9783837920376
• Kael, Pauline, 5001 Nights At The Movies, Zenith Books, 1982. ISBN 0-09-933550-6
• King, Greg, Sharon Tate and The Manson Murders, Barricade Books, New York, 2000. ISBN 1-56980-157-6
• Leaming, Barbara (1981). Polanski, The Filmmaker as Voyeur: A Biography. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0671249851.
• Parker, John (1994). Polanski. London: Victor Gollancz Ltd. ISBN 0575056150.
• Polanski, Roman (1973) Roman Polanski's What? From the original screenplay, London: Lorrimer. 91p. ISBN 0856470333
• Polanski, Roman (1973) What?, New York: Third press, 91p, ISBN 089388121X
• Polanski, Roman (1975) Three film scripts: Knife in the water [original screenplay by Jerzy Skolimowski, Jakub Goldberg and Roman Polanski; translated by Boleslaw Sulik]; Repulsion [original screenplay by Roman Polanski and Gerard Brach]; Cul-de-sac [original screenplay by Roman Polanski and Gerard Brach], introduction by Boleslaw Sulik, New York: Fitzhenry and Whiteside, 275p, ISBN 0064300625
• Polanski, Roman (1984) Knife in the water, Repulsion and Cul-de-sac: three filmscripts by Roman Polanski, London: Lorrimer, 214p, ISBN 0856470511 (hbk) ISBN 0856470929 (pbk)
• Polanski, Roman (1984, 1985) Roman by Polanski, New York: Morrow. ISBN 0688026214, London: Heinemann. London: Pan. 456p. ISBN 0434591807 (hbk) ISBN 0330285971 (pbk)
• Polanski, Roman (2003) Le pianiste, Paris: Avant-Scene, 126p, ISBN 2847250166
• Visser, John J. 2008 Satan-el: Fallen Mourning Star (Chapter 5). Covenant People's Books. ISBN 978-0-557-03412-3

External links

• Roman Polanski at IMDb
• Roman Polanski's official webpage

Video links

• Additional CBS videos
• Interview with Charlie Rose, March 2000