Vladimír Michálek (born 2 November 1956 in

Mladá Boleslav Mladá Boleslav (; german: Jungbunzlau) is a city in the Central Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 42,000 inhabitants. Mladá Boleslav is the second most populated city in the region and a major centre of the Czech automotive ind ...

) is a Czech

film director A film director controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfilment of that vision. The director has a key role in choosing the cast members, p ...

and

screenwriter A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based. ...

Life

Michálek graduated from Czech film Academy ''FAMU'', Prague, in 1992. Starting during his academic study he was filming documentaries. He joined the

Barrandov Studios Barrandov Studios is a set of film studios in Prague, Czech Republic. It is the largest film studio in the country and one of the largest in Europe. Several major Hollywood productions have been made here, including ''Mission Impossible'', '' ...

as assistant director, where he worked with

Andrew Birkin Andrew Timothy Birkin (born 9 December 1945) is an English screenwriter and director. He was born the only son of Lieutenant-Commander David Birkin and his wife, actress Judy Campbell. One of his sisters is the actress and singer Jane Birkin. W ...

(

Burning Secret ''Burning Secret'' is a 1988 drama film, based on the short story ''Brennendes Geheimnis'' by Stefan Zweig, about an American diplomat's son who befriends a mysterious baron while staying at an Austrian spa during the 1920s. This symbol-fille ...

Reinhard Hauff Reinhard Hauff (born 23 May 1939) is a German film director. His works, which were mostly carried out in the late 1960s to early 1990s, are known for their social and political commentary. '' Stammheim'', which is based on the activities of the Re ...

Ted Kotcheff William Theodore Kotcheff (born April 7, 1931) is a Bulgarian-Canadian film and television director, writer and producer, known primarily for his work on British and American television productions such as ''Armchair Theatre'' and '' Law & Order ...

( The Shooter),

Margarethe von Trotta Margarethe von Trotta (; born 21 February 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, and actress. She has been referred to as a "leading force" of the New German Cinema movement.

and

Bernhard Wicki Bernhard Wicki (28 October 1919 – 5 January 2000) was an Austrian actor and film director. Life and career Wicki studied in the city of Breslau such topics as art history, history and German literature. In 1938, he transferred to the d ...

. He has four children.

Work

1994 was the year of the release of his first

feature film A feature film or feature-length film is a narrative film (motion picture or "movie") with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole presentation in a commercial entertainment program. The term ''feature film'' originall ...

, ''Amerika'', a free adaptation of the Kafka novel. In 1996 ''Forgotten Light'' followed, a film adaption of the Jakub Deml novel. The film ran on the

Karlovy Vary International Film Festival The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival ( cs, Mezinárodní filmový festival Karlovy Vary) is a film festival held annually in July in Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic. The Karlovy Vary Festival is one of the oldest in the world and has become ...

, as did this next movie, ''Sekal Has to Die'', two years later. The latter won ten Czech Lion awards, including Best Direction, and succeeded ''Forgotten Light'' as the Czech

Oscar Oscar, OSCAR, or The Oscar may refer to: People * Oscar (given name), an Irish- and English-language name also used in other languages; the article includes the names Oskar, Oskari, Oszkár, Óscar, and other forms. * Oscar (Irish mythology), ...

-nominee.Press release for Autumn Spring
(PDF) As with ''America'', he wrote the screenplay for his film ''Angel Exit'' 2000. The film won the 2002 Daring Digital Award on the

Jeonju International Film Festival Jeonju International Film Festival (JIFF, Korean: 전주국제영화제, Hanja: 全州國際映畵祭) is an Asian film festival. It was launched in 2000 as a non-competitive film festival with partial competition. It introduces independent a ...

. Autumn Spring (2001), starring

Vlastimil Brodský Vlastimil Brodský (15 December 1920 – 20 April 2002) was a Czech actor. He appeared in more than one hundred films, and is considered a key figure in the postwar development of Czech cinema. One of his best-known roles was as the title charac ...

in his last role, received favorable reviews, including in

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

and

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

. It won a number of prizes, such as the Best Foreign Language Film at the 2003

The Comedy Festival The Comedy Festival, formerly known as the US Comedy Arts Festival, was a comedy festival that ran from 1995 to 2008. The festival included stand-up comedy performances, appearances by the casts of television shows, and has a film component calle ...

, as well as the Audience Awards of each the 2002

Cleveland International Film Festival The Cleveland International Film Festival (CIFF) is an annual film festival based in Cleveland, Ohio. It is the largest film festival in Ohio. It was first held in 1977, showing eight films over a period of eight weeks at the Cedar Lee Theatre. It ...

, the 2002

St. Louis International Film Festival The St. Louis International Film Festival (also known as SLIFF or Cinema St. Louis) is an annual film festival in St. Louis, Missouri, which has been running since 1992. The coordinating organization changed its name to "Cinema St. Louis" in 2003 ...

and the 2003

Sedona Film Festival The Sedona International Film Festival (SIFF) is an annual, eight-day film festival in Sedona, Arizona. The festival was founded in 1994. The Sedona Film Festival screens feature films, documentary films, short films, animated films, and studen ...

. He is also working for TV productions such as the 2003 series ''Záchranári''. He directed the music videos for the song ''Černí andělé'' (''Black Angels'') by the band

Lucie Lucie is the French and Czech form of the female name Lucia. Notable people with the name include: Given name * Lucie Ahl, British tennis player * Lucie Arnaz, American actress * Lucie Aubrac, member of the French Resistance * Lucie Balthaz ...

,Vladimír Michálek
at fdb.cz (Czech). and

Chinaski Henry Charles "Hank" Chinaski is the literary alter ego of the American writer Charles Bukowski, appearing in five of Bukowski's novels, a number of his short stories and poems, and the films '' Barfly'' and ''Factotum''. Although much of Chinas ...

's ''Podléhám''.

Filmography

Documentary Films

* ''In the Temple of Nature'' (1987) * ''The Painful Silence'' (1990) * ''Oh Mr. Anderson'' (1992)

Feature Films

* ''Amerika'' (also screenplay, 1994) * ''

Forgotten Light ''Forgotten Light'' ( cs, Zapomenuté světlo) is a 1996 Czech film directed by Vladimír Michálek. The screenplay by Czech-American Milena Jelinek is based on a 1934 book by Jakub Deml which is considered a masterpiece of Czech literature of t ...

'' (''Zapomenuté světlo'', 1996) * ''

Sekal Has to Die ''Sekal Has to Die'' ( cs, Je třeba zabít Sekala, pl, Zabić Sekala) is a 1998 Czech film directed by Vladimír Michálek. It was the Czech Republic's submission to the 71st Academy Awards for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, ...

'' (''Je třeba zabít Sekala'', 1998) * ''Prague Stories'' (compilation contribution, also screenplay, 1999) * '' Angel Exit'' (screenplay written with

Jáchym Topol Jáchym Topol (born 4 August 1962) is a Czech poet, novelist, musician and journalist who became a laureate of the Czech State Award for Literature in October 2017 for his novel ''Sensitive Man''. Life Jáchym Topol was born in Prague, Czech ...

, ''Anděl Exit'', 2000) * ''Autumn Spring'' (''Babí léto'' 2001) * ''Of Parents and Children'' (also screenplay, ''O rodičích a dětech'', 2008) * ''City of Birds'' (''Město ptáků'', upcoming)Cinema Soleil Productions
City of Birds

TV films

* ''Jistota'' (1999) * ''Lovec a datel'' (2004) * ''Pískovna'' (2004)

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Michalek, Vladimir Czech film directors Czech screenwriters Male screenwriters 1956 births Living people People from Mladá Boleslav