Jiří Menzel

Jiří Menzel (Czech: [ˈjɪr̝iː ˈmɛntsl̩] ( listen)) (born February 23, 1938, Prague) is a Czech film director, theatre director, actor, and screenwriter. His films often combine a humanistic view of the world with sarcasm and provocative cinematography. Some of these films are adapted from works by Czech writers such as Bohumil Hrabal and Vladislav Vančura.

He became famous in 1967, when his first feature film, Closely Watched Trains, won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.^[1] His controversial film Larks on a String was filmed in 1969, but was initially banned by the [Czechoslovakia] government. It was finally released in 1990 after the fall of the Communist regime. The film won the Golden Bear at the 40th Berlin International Film Festival.^[2]

Menzel was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film again in 1986 with his dark comedy My Sweet Little Village. In 1987, he was a member of the jury at the 37th Berlin International Film Festival.^[3] In 1989 he was a member of the jury at the 16th Moscow International Film Festival.^[4] In 1995 he was a member of the jury at the 19th Moscow International Film Festival.^[5]

Filmography as director [edit]

Year	English title	Original title	Notes
1960	Prefabricated Houses	Domy z panelů	School film
1963	Our Mr. Foerster Died	Umřel nám pan Foerster	School film
1965	Concert '65	Koncert 65	Short documentary
1965	Crime at the Girls School	Zločin v dívčí škole	Segment "Crime at the Girls School"
1966	Pearls of the Deep	Perličky na dně	Segment "Smrt pana Baltazara"
1966	Closely Watched Trains	Ostře sledované vlaky
1968	Crime in a Music Hall	Zločin v šantánu
1968	Capricious Summer	Rozmarné léto
1969	Larks on a String	Skřivánci na niti	Banned and not released until 1990
1974	Altered Landscapes	Proměny krajiny	Short documentary
1974	Who Looks for Gold?	Kdo hledá zlaté dno
1976	Seclusion Near a Forest	Na samotě u lesa
1978	Those Wonderful Movie Cranks	Báječní muži s klikou
1980	Cutting It Short	Postřižiny
1981	Tři v tom		TV theatre
1982	Krasosmutnění		TV film
1982	Dr. Johann Faust, Praha II., Karlovo nám. 40		TV theatre
1984	The Snowdrop Festival	Slavnosti sněženek
1985	My Sweet Little Village	Vesničko má středisková
1986	Chocolate Cop	Die Schokoladenschnüffler
1989	End of Old Times	Konec starých časů
1981	Audience		TV film
1991	Beggar's Opera	Žebrácká opera
1993	Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin	Život a neobyčejná dobrodružství vojáka Ivana Čonkina
1998	Jacobowski a plukovník		TV film
2002	Ten Minutes Older		Segment "One Moment"
2006	I Served the King of England	Obsluhoval jsem anglického krále

Hospoda (The Pub) (1996). A sitcom where Menzel played a psychiatrist, who came everyday to one Prague pub. He made lots of fun with his friends.

Škvorecký J. Jiří Menzel and the history of the "Closely Watched Trains". Boulder: East European Monographs, 1982