Karel Zeman

Karel Zeman
Born	November 3, 1910(1910-11-03) Ostroměř, then Austria-Hungary
Died	April 5, 1989(1989-04-05) (aged 78) Zlín, Czechoslovakia
Occupation	Film director, animator
Influenced by	Jules Verne, Gustave Doré, Hermína Týrlová
Influenced	Terry Gilliam
Children	Ludmila Zeman
Awards	1980 Order of the Republic

Karel Zeman (November 3, 1910 - April 5, 1989) was a Czech film director, artist, production designer and animator. Because of his creative use of special effects and animation in his films, he has often been called the "Czech Méliès."

Life

Zeman was born on November 3, 1910, in Ostroměř (near Nová Paka) in what was then Austria-Hungary. In the 1920s, he studied at a French advertising school, and worked at an advertising studio in Marseilles until 1936. It was in France that he first worked with animation, filming an ad for soup. He then returned to his home country (by now Czechoslovakia), after visiting Egypt, Yugoslavia, and Greece.

Back in Czechoslovakia, Zeman advertised for Czech firms like Baťa and Tatra. At Baťa's window-dressing school, where he was teaching, Zeman met the animator Elmar Klos and showed him a sample of his work. Klos offered Zeman a job at Zlín's animation studio. After some consideration (his wife and children were already established in Brno), Zeman accepted the job in 1943. At the studio, Zeman met the pioneering animator Hermína Týrlová and, collaborating with his brother Bořivoj Zeman, made his first short film, Vánoční sen (1945).

Zeman then went on to solo work, including a series of shorts starring a puppet called Mr. Prokouk. His half-hour film Král Lávra (1950), from the poem by Karel Havlíček Borovský, won him a National Award, and was followed by his first feature film, Poklad ptačího ostrova (1952). His most unusual film may be the short Inspirace (1948), which tells a wordless, poetic love story using animated glass figurines.

It was in 1955, however, that Zeman began the work for which he is probably most famous: six feature films that combine live-action and animation techniques to create artistic visual styles. These were:

• Cesta do pravěku (1955), inspired by Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth and the paintings of Zdeněk Burian
• Vynález zkázy (1958), based on Verne's Facing the Flag, and filmed to emulate the original illustrations for Verne's novels
• Baron Prášil (1961), celebrating the legendary Baron Munchausen and the engravings of Gustave Doré
• Bláznova kronika (1964), a satire of the Thirty Years' War, suggested by the drawings of Matthäus Merian
• Ukradená vzducholoď (1967), inspired by the Verne novels Two Years' Vacation and The Mysterious Island, the Art Nouveau style, and the 1891 Prague Centennial Exhibition
• Na kometě (1970), an anti-war fantasy based on Verne's Hector Servadac

After this, Zeman experimented with more classical forms of animation, beginning with seven shorts about Sinbad the Sailor which were then expanded into the feature film Pohádky tisíce a jedné noci (1974). His final films were Čarodějův učeň (1977), from the novel The Satanic Mill by Otfried Preußler, and Pohádka o Honzíkovi a Mařence (1980).

He died in Zlín on April 5, 1989, a few months before the Velvet Revolution.

Filmography

Feature Films

Year	Original Czech title	Standard English title	US release title
1952	Poklad ptačího ostrova	The Treasure of Bird Island	N/A
1955	Cesta do pravěku	Journey to Prehistory	Journey to the Beginning of Time
1958	Vynález zkázy	An Invention for Destruction	The Fabulous World of Jules Verne
1961	Baron Prášil	Baron Munchausen	The Fabulous Baron Munchausen
1964	Bláznova kronika	A Jester's Tale	War of the Fools
1967	Ukradená vzducholoď	The Stolen Airship	N/A
1970	Na kometě	On the Comet	On the Comet
1974	Pohádky tisíce a jedné noci	Tales of 1,001 Nights	Adventures of Sinbad the Sailor
1977	Čarodějův učeň	Krabat — The Sorcerer's Apprentice	N/A
1980	Pohádka o Honzíkovi a Mařence	The Tale of John and Mary	N/A

Short Films

Year	Original Czech title	English title	Notes
1945	Vánoční sen	The Christmas Dream	Released in the US as A Christmas Dream
1946	Křeček	The Hamster
1946	Podkova pro štěstí	Horseshoe for Luck	The first Mr. Prokouk film
1947	Pan Prokouk ouřaduje	Mr. Prokouk, Bureaucrat
1947	Brigády	Voluntary work	The third Mr. Prokouk film
1947	Pan Prokouk v pokušení	Mr. Prokouk in Temptation
1948	Pan Prokouk filmuje	Mr. Prokouk Filming
1948	Inspirace	Inspiration
1949	Pan Prokouk vynálezcem	Mr. Prokouk, Inventor
1950	Král Lávra	King Lávra
1955	Pan Prokouk, Přítel zvířátek	Mr. Prokouk, Friend of the Animals
1958	Pan Proukock detektivem	Mr. Prokouk, Detective
1959	Pan Proukock akrobatem	Mr. Prokouk, Acrobat
1971	Dobrodružství námořníka Sindibáda	Adventures of Sinbad the Sailor
1972	Druhá cesta námořníka Sindibáda	The Second Voyage of Sinbad the Sailor
1973	V zemi obrů. Třetí cesta námořníka Sindibáda	In the Land of Giants (the third voyage)
1973	Magnetová hora. Čtvrtá cesta námořníka Sindibáda	The Magnet Mountain (the fourth voyage)
1973	Létající koberec. Pátá cesta námořníka Sindibáda	The Flying Carpet (the fifth voyage)
1974	Mořský sultán. Šestá cesta námořníka Sindibáda	The Sultan of the Sea (the sixth voyage)
1974	Zkrocený démon. Sedmá cesta námořníka Sindibáda	Taming the Demon (the seventh voyage)

External links

• Karel Zeman at the Internet Movie Database
• Gallery of Czech stop-action animation including clips from The Fabulous World of Karel Zeman.
• Karel Zeman filmography detailed filmography of Karel Zeman in Polish.
• A Strange Introduction to Karel Zeman: The Czech Visionary (TCM Movie Morlocks)