Wojciech Kilar

Sound

Biography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Wojciech Kilar (Polish: [ˈvɔjt͡ɕex ˈkilar]; 17 July 1932 – 29 December 2013) was a Polish classical and film music composer. His film scores have won many honors including the best score award for the music to Ziemia obiecana / The Promised Land in 1975, followed by the Prix Louis Delluc in 1980 for the music to Le Roi et l'Oiseau / The King and the Mockingbird, and an award at the Cork International Film Festival for the music to From A Far Country (1981) about the life of Pope John Paul II. One of his greatest successes came with his score to Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula in 1993 which received the ASCAP Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Producers in Los Angeles, nominated also for the Saturn Award for Best Music in a science fiction, fantasy, or horror film in San Francisco in 1993. In 2003, he won the César Award for Best Film Music written for The Pianist, at France's 28th César Awards Ceremony in 2003, for which he also received a BAFTA nomination. The Pianist (soundtrack) featured his "Moving to the Ghetto Oct. 31, 1940" with the other 10 tracks being works by Frédéric Chopin. The music in the movie includes pieces by Beethoven and Bach. The vast majority of Wojciech Kilar's work remains undiscovered by the music public at large, despite having written music for well over 100 films, including: Bram Stoker's Dracula, Death and the Maiden, The Portrait of a Lady, The Ninth Gate, Pan Tadeusz, The Pianist, Zemsta, and We Own the Night.

Filmography Movies

A documentary film about Wojciech Kilar, his life and music. The film is a candid confession of a composer who is aware of his life and creative choices. Wojciech Kilar is a world-renowned artist who has been following his individual, independent path for years. The film uses unique materials from the composer's private collection, previously unpublished. The realization took more than a year, the footage was shot in Jasna Góra, Seville, Vorochta, Paris.

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Wojciech Kilar. Credo

Self

Krzysztof Zanussi about his collaboration with Wojciech KilarMOVIE

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Krzysztof Zanussi about his collaboration with Wojciech Kilar

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Director Krzysztof Zanussi's collaboration with Wojciech Kilar was a worldwide phenomenon. The artists' paths had already converged in the 1960s, and were not to part until Kilar's death. The composer wrote music to the young filmmaker's debut picture Struktura kryształu / The Structure of Crystals (1969), and Zanussi was so impressed with both the soundtrack and Kilar's understanding and general savvy that he kept submitting his artistic proposals only to him. As a result this outstanding duo completed over forty feature films, as well as documentaries and television works. In a short story by Krzysztof Zanussi we learn more about this unique, long-term cooperation.

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Krzysztof Zanussi about his collaboration with Wojciech Kilar

Self (archive footage)

Production

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Blind Chance

7.5(0.2K)

Witek runs after a train. Three variations follow on how such a seemingly banal incident could influence the rest of Witek's life.

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Blind Chance

Original Music Composer

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The Pianist

8.4(10.1K)

The true story of pianist Władysław Szpilman's experiences in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. When the Jews of the city find themselves forced into a ghetto, Szpilman finds work playing in a café; and when his family is deported in 1942, he stays behind, works for a while as a laborer, and eventually goes into hiding in the ruins of the war-torn city.

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The Pianist

Original Music Composer

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The Promised Land

7.3(0.1K)

In nineteenth-century Łódź, Poland, three friends want to make a lot of money by building and investing in a textile factory. An exceptional portrait of rapid industrial expansion is shown through the eyes of one Polish town.

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The Promised Land

Original Music Composer

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The Ninth Gate

6.5(3.4K)

A rare book dealer finds himself at the heart of a string of paranormal events when he is hired to find the last two copies of a text, The Nine Gates of the Kingdom of Shadows, capable of summoning the Devil.

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The Ninth Gate

Original Music Composer

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Death and the Maiden

7.1(0.6K)

A political activist is convinced that her guest is a man who once tortured her for the government.

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Death and the Maiden

Original Music Composer

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The Last Days

5.5(0.1K)

Romance brings two warring families together in this historical drama. As citizens fight for independence in 1810s Lithuania, Tadeusz, the son of a murderer, and Zosia, a young woman, come together for a wedding against a backdrop of changing politics, ancient traditions, and the uncertain future of a country.

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The Last Days

Original Music Composer

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Bram Stoker's Dracula

7.5(5.8K)

Count Dracula, a 15th-century prince, is condemned to live off the blood of the living for eternity. Young lawyer Jonathan Harker is sent to Dracula's castle to finalise a land deal, but when the Count sees a photo of Harker's fiancée, Mina, the spitting image of his dead wife, he imprisons him and sets off for London to track her down.

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Bram Stoker's Dracula

Orchestrator

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