director Krzysztof Kieślowski
screenplay Krzysztof Kieślowski
director of photography Jacek Petrycki
music Krzysztof Knittel
with Jerzy Stuhr, Małgorzata Ząbkowska, Ewa Pokas, Stefan Czyżewski, Jerzy Nowak, Tadeusz Bradecki
awards
Golden Medal and FIPRESCI Prize at the Moscow International Film Festival, 1979
Grand Prix, Gold Hugo at the Chicago International Film Festival, 1980
INTERFILM Prize (International Evangelical Jury) at the International Film Festival in West Berlin, 1980
Golden Lions for ‘Best Film’ and Bronze Lions as individual prize for Jerzy Stuhr for Best Actor (together with his part in ‘Chance’) at the 6th Polish Film Festival in Gdańsk, 1979
Jantar Prize for Krzysztof Kieślowski and audience prize for Jerzy Stuhr at Youth and Film, Film Meetings in Koszalin, 1979
Audience Prize at the International Film Forum ‘Man-Work-Creation’ in Lublin, 1979
’Film’ magazine award, Golden Camera, for Best Acting Debut for Tadeusz Bradecki, 1979
[DIALOGUE FROM THE FILM]
Director: We’ll be soon celebrating the fifth anniversary. We’ll have important guests, maybe someone from the Ministry. The event must not pass without trace. And this is why you, Mr Mosz, will record it on film. Filip Mosz: Film? Sorry, I can’t. I’ve only just bought my camera. Director: You’ll learn. Film is the most important of the arts, as someone said. Can’t remember who. Filip: Lenin. Director: All the more so then. Well, what do you say? Filip: All right.
TADEUSZ LUBELSKI, FROM ‘PERSONNEL’ TO ‘NO END’ OR THE SEVEN PHASES OF CAMERAWORK [OD ‘PERSONELU’ DO ‘BEZ KOŃCA’, CZYLI SIEDEM FAZ ODWRACANIA KAMERY, [W:] KINO KRZYSZTOFA KIEŚLOWSKIEGO (POD RED. T. LUBELSKIEGO)], KRAKÓW 1997
On a higher level of reception, ‘Camera Buff’ has a universal message; it tells about the birth of an artist, about a vocation he discovers in himself. (…) His embodiment is Filip Mosz, a young artist just beginning to ‘present his own vision of the world.’ ‘Camera Buff’ is a record of his victories and failures, but mainly of traps set for him. (…) The hero starts out with a private and humble aim. He buys a camera to film his little daughter (…) Urged by his boss to make his first film, he tastes the freedom of the film-maker. (…) In the next stage, he relishes the apparently limitless capabilities of the camera. (…) But then he also becomes familiar with the darker and disturbing side of ‘presenting the world as it is.’ (…) After his uncompromising documentary is shown on television, his workmate is sacked. (…) Filip realizes that he is not able to carry the responsibility for his own films.
history periods
