Renowned Czech director and playwright Jiri Menzel died at his home on Saturday, September 5, local time, at the age of 82.
Iger Menzel (1938-2020)
Menzel has been plagued by illness in his later years, rarely appearing in public after a brain surgery in 2017. After a long struggle, he finally lost the disease.
The news was made public by his wife, Olga Menzelova, 42, who is also a filmmaker, on Facebook Sunday.
Menzelova said, "It is our greatest honor and honor to be with you on your last pilgrimage to eternity. Your love for me, and your love for our children, is the kind of love that never lets go of conditions."
She added, "I'm also grateful to you, the last three years have been hard. You've been helping me with your courage, your appetite and your will to live, and your humor. I'm sure we'll meet again, either way. It must be so, because I don't think there could have been any other way. We love you, from the bottom of our hearts, forever."
Menzel was an important exponent of the Czech New Wave of the 1960s.
His 1966 film "The Train Under Constant Surveillance" won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and his other representative works include "Capricious Summer" (1968), "Wingless Sparrow" (1969), "I Served the King of England" (2006), etc., and his works have been shortlisted for European film festivals many times and are also the three major European regulars.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-center-line" > "Czech New Wave"</h1>
Of the new wave of cinema that swept the world in the 1960s, the Czech New Wave was one of the most radical, productive and fascinating movements. It was also the most important political movement in post-war Central and Eastern Europe and was one of the factors that led to the "Prague Spring" of 1968, which ended with the collapse of Soviet tanks.
Beginning in the 1960s, Czech politics liberalized and various arts flourished in the country.
In this context, the "Czech New Wave", led by young people at the Film Academy, was initially influenced by other New Waves in Europe, striking a stark attack on soviet-style realism and the hypocrisy of cinematic formalism.
Unlike other New Wave movements in Europe, Czech New Wave directors are more focused on film storytelling techniques and use more non-professional actors.
The CzechOslovak New Wave
The "Czech New Wave" began with Milos Forman's Black Peter in 1963, Věra Chytilová's Something Different and Jaromil Jires's Cry, forming a strong creative community, among others such as Jan Svankmajer, Menzel, Jan Nemec, etc. Most of them later gained great international fame.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-center-line" > "shoemaker" Menzel</h1>
Born in Prague in 1938, Menzel began his career in film in 1962 after studying directing at the Prague Film Academy.
In 1968, his first feature film, The Train under Close Surveillance (filmed in 1966), won the 40th Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, and he rose to fame.
The film tells the story of a young train dispatcher during the German occupation of Czechoslovakia in World War II.
Closely Observed Trains
The film is based on the 1965 novel of the same name by the famous Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal, whose work has been adapted into films by Menzel six times, including 2006's I Serve the King of England.
"My luck is more important than my sanity." In 2016, he said as he recalled his Oscar-winning film. "I value more than all the awards and medals this film has won for a lifetime friendship with Hrabar."
In fact, Menzel's films are in keeping with the Czech literary tradition, full of humanistic views, satire, and challenging authority.
In 1968, "The Closely Watched Train" won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film
Like other directors of his generation, Menzel faced political repression from the Czech authorities' harsh censorship of films.
In 1969, his film Wingless Sparrow, which depicted a group of people who were politically persecuted and forced to work in a scrap factory, was banned and not released until 1990. Menzel was also banned from making films for 5 years.
Menzel once recalled those dark days:
"Some people lose their jobs, some people lose their works, some people lose their lives. I was doing a TV series, but a friend of mine stole it and signed his name, just because I won an Oscar, and on the censorship "blacklist", he said , 'I don't deserve to make a Czech movie!' They also forced me to admit, 'I don't want to make movies.'"
Larks on a String (1969)
Menzel's films are adept at depicting the bittersweet stories of life under the totalitarian era, but full of optimism, often full of humor and nostalgia. Many of his works are highly regarded by film audiences around the world.
His last work was the 2013 comedy Donšajni (Lustful).
Menzel was awarded the Czech Lion Award for Lifetime Achievement and was honoured by the Karlovy Vary Film Festival. He has also received the Medal of Merit, the French Medal of Arts and Literature, and many other international awards.
In 2013, Menzel visited China as a jury member of the Golden Jubilee Award at the Shanghai International Film Festival, and in an interview with reporters, he described himself as "making a movie like a shoemaker".
During the 2013 Festival, the film critic "Big Strange" had the privilege of meeting Menzel
"From the very beginning of my first work, I wanted to bring a positive spirit to the audience, rather than making the audience feel heavy after watching it. If I were a shoemaker and I was going to make shoes, I would also like the person wearing the shoes to feel comfortable and wear them for a long time, not the kind of shoes that look really good but hurt when worn for a long time. ...... But I don't like that kind of very simple comedy, just laugh for laughs, the kind of comedy that doesn't have depth. This kind of laughter doesn't mean anything to me."
——Interview with Tiantian Xinbao in 2013
In 2006, he married his current wife, Olga Menzelova, and has two daughters.
Both Menzel and the Czech New Wave are immortal.
This article was first published in the Adventure Movie: Cinematik
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