November 7-9 & 14 -16, 2003

 Broadway Performance Hall, 1625 Broadway, Seattle

produced by Seattle-Gdynia Sister City Association
 
Jerzy Hoffman was born on March 15th 1932 in Krakow, in a family of doctors. In 1940 they were exiled to Siberia. He came back to Poland after WW2. After graduating from high school in Bydgoszcz, he moved to Moscow, to study film directing at the State Film Institute. He received the diploma in 1955.

Between 1954 and 1965 he worked in a team with Edward Skorzewski. They co-directed 27 documentaries (their Hooligans marked the beginning of a "black series" in the Polish documentary film) and 3 features: Gangsterzy i filantropi (The Gangsters and the Philantropists,1962), Prawo i pięść (The Law and the Fist, 1964) and Trzy kroki po ziemi (Three Steps on the Earth, 1965).

1966 was the year of Jerzy Hoffman's first independent project. After the successful adaptation of the last part of Henryk Sienkiewicz's Trilogy, Pan Wolodyjowski (1968), he made its prequel, The Deluge which was nominated for the 1974 Academy Award for Best Foreign Picture.

His other features include Tredowata (The Leper, 1976), Do krwi ostatniej (Till the Last Drop of Blood, 1978), Znachor (The Quack,1981), Wedle wyrokow Twoich (Be It Thy Will, 1983), Piekna nieznajoma (The Beautiful Stranger, 1992). In the late 1990s Jerzy Hoffman made his greatest dream come true: he filmed With Fire and Sword (1999), thus making the Sienkiewicz Trilogy complete. The movie proved to be the biggest box office success in the last 20 years of the Polish film history.

Not worthy of his power is he who abuses it".

Wincenty Kadlubek, 13th century chronicler

"Jozef Hen and I created a story of eternal human passions: the craving for power and the need of love, the righteousness and the hatred, the loyalty and the betrayal - the never-ending combat between the Good and the Evil. We used the historical setting to show the amazingly attractive material culture of our forefathers, well documented by the archaeologists, as well as to present world of magic and pagan beliefs from the centuries preceding the baptism of Poland in 996 A.D. - the world of a harmonious co-existence of humans and gods.
Our picture is far from being a history textbook. It's a fairy tale. A tale for those who are eager to explore their roots.
I am certain that the film will appeal to thousands of viewers, both visually and emotionally."

Jerzy Hoffman, the director of "When The Sun Was God - An Ancient Tale"

"When the Sun was God - an Ancient Tale", 2002 (Katarzyna Bujakiewicz and Ewa Wisniewska)

 "With Fire and Sword", 1999 (Izabella Scorupco and Michal Zebrowski)
 

"The Deluge", 1974 (Daniel Olbrychski as Kmicic)

 "Pan Wolodyjowski", 1969 (center: Magdalena Zawadzka as Basia and Tadeusz Lomnicki as Pan Wolodyjowski)

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