Krzysztof Kieslowski

Krzysztof Kieślowski graduated from the National Film School in Łódź (1969). He worked as a documentarist for years before gradually moving over to features. His early films often dealt with issues involving "the average work day" in socialist Poland, and he became one of the leading figures of Poland's "cinema of moral anxiety." His dramatic output is characterized by a generalizing message, in which the themes that come to the fore treat ethical and moral ambiguity, coincidence, and fate as determining forces in human life.

He grabbed the attention of the world with the ten-part TV series Decalogue (1987–89), a reinterpretation of the Ten Commandments, two episodes of which were expanded and released in theaters (A Short Film About Killing, 1987; A Short Film About Love, 1988). He ended his career with the psychological mystery The Double Life of Veronique (1991) and the loose trilogy Three Colours (1993–94).

MFF Karlovy Vary