Country: Kazakhstan
Year: 1960
Duration: 87'


"It was 1959. At that time I was a twentyyearold poet and I did not know anything about films. Wajda and Andrzejewski were looking for a subject for a film to be set in contemporary times about two characters. What situation would have been 'new' for a story with two people? Suddenly I had lightning strike. They had to go face to face in a match, a sports game, a clash, a game, a duel... at the end of which one of them was to get the better of the other, to ridicule the other. One would humiliate the other or make the other fall in love without getting involved in the game... In a week we had the screenplay ready. It kept on being a game for me, and still trying to have some fun I accepted to play the role of the boxer in the film. Afterwards I read in the criticism that Niewinni czarodzieje was the drama of masks, of isolation, of poses. I read that the protagonists could not find each other in this setting, that they could not talk to each other without lying, and that they were not able to admit to the other one that the liked each other, desired each other, or were beginning to fall in love. When those 'innocent magicians' challenged each other to the match game, it was their dignity and their humiliation that they were playing with. There was really true psychological struggle going on between this man and this woman bent over the table, between two half-undressed beings that were throwing a box of matches." (Jerzy Skolimowski, "Positif", n. 135, February 1972)

Biography

film director

Andrzej Wajda

FILMOGRAFIA

Film: 1951: Ceramika ilzecka (La ceramika di Ilz), cm. doc.; 1954: Pokolenie (Generazione); 1956: Kanal (I dannati di Varsavia); Ide do slonca (Vado verso il sole), cm. doc.; 1958: Popiól i diament (Cenere e diamanti); 1959: Lotna; 1960: Niewinni czarodzieje (Ingenui perversi); 1961: Samson (Sansone); Sibirska ledi Magbet (Lady Macbeth Sibiriana), Jugoslavia; 1962: Warszawa (Varsavia), ep. di L'amour à vingt ans (L'amore a vent'anni); 1965: Popioly (Ceneri); 1967: Vrata raja - The Gates to Paradise, Jugoslavia - GB; 1968: Przekladaniec (Garbuglio), mm. tv; Wszystko na sprzedaz (Tutto in vendita), 1969: Polowanie na muchy (Caccia alle mosche); 1970: Brzezina (Il bosco di betulle), tv; Krajobraz po bitwie (Paesaggio dopo la battaglia); 1971: Pilatus und andere (Pilato e gli altri), tv, RFT; 1972: Wesele (Le nozze); 1974: Ziemia obiecana (La terra promessa); 1976: The Shadow Line / Smuga cienia (La linea d'ombra), Polonia-GB; Czlowiek z marmuru (L'uomo di marmo); 1977: Umarla klasa (La classe morta), mm. doc. tv; 1978: Bez znieczulenia (Senza anestesia); Zaproszenie do wnetrza (Invito a entrare) mm. doc.; 1979: Panny z Wilka (Le signorine di Wilko); Dyrygent (Il direttore d'orchestra); Pogoda domu niechaj bedzie z Toba.. . (Che la pace della casa sia con voi...), mm. doc. tv; 1980: Z biegiem lat, z biegiem dni (Nel corso degli anni, nel corso dei giorni), serie tv, co-regia Edward Klosinski; 1981: Czlowiek z zelaza (L'uomo di ferro); 1982: Danton (id.), Francia-Polonia; 1983: Eine Liebe in Deutschland / Un amour en Allemagne (Un amore in Germania), RFT-Francia; 1986: Kronica wypadków milosnych (Cronaca di avvenimenti amorosi); 1988: Les possédés (I demoni), Francia.

Cast

& Credits

Director: Andrzej Wajda.
Screenplay: Jerzy Andrzejewski, Jerzy Skolimowski.
Director of photography: Krzysztof Winiewicz.
Art director: Leszek Wajda
Editor: Wleslawa Otocka, Aurella Rut.
Music: Krzysztof Trzcifiski Komeda; canzone cantata da Slawa Przybylska.
Sound: Leszek Wronko, Leonard Ksiezak.
Cast and characters: Tadeusz Lomnicki (Andrzej/Bazyli), Krystyn StypuIkowska (Magda/Pelagia), Wanda Koczewska (Mirka), Zbigniew CybuIski (Edmund), Roman Polanski (Polo), Krzysztof T. Komeda (Komeda), Kalina Jedrusik Dygat (giornalista), Teresa Szmiglelowna (infermiera), Jerzy Skolimowski (pugile), Andrzej Nowakowski.
Director of Production: Stanislaw Adler.
Production company: Gruppo "Kadr".
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