Janina Falkowska is Professor in the Film Studies Department at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada, specializing in East-Central European and Western European cinemas. Her publications include The Political Films of Andrzej Wajda (Berghahn Books 1996), National Cinemas in Postwar East-Central Europe (ed.), and, co-authored with Marek Haltof, The New Polish Cinema (Flicks Books 2003).

“Falkowska’s comprehensive survey of Wajda’s artistic evolution is a worthwhile addition to the growing critical literature on this exceptional filmmaker. In practical terms, the monographs is also useable as a textbook and…can serve as a point of departure for the continuing discourse von Andrzej Wajda and his films.”  ·  Slavic and East European Journal“...a highly readable, jargon-free account of Wajda's life, education, formative experiences and, especially, his incredibly varied body of creative work…This is going to be the standard work in English on this important Polish film director. It does a good job of presenting Wajda to the English-speaking reader, and it should be purchased by any university library with a film-studies interest.”  ·  The Slavonic and East European Review

• AcknowledgementsIntroduction: Andrzej Wajda: His Words and his ArchivesChapter 1. The Life and Times of Andrzej WajdaChapter 2. The Birth of a Master: Films of the FiftiesChapter 3. Fight for Perfection: Films of the SixtiesChapter 4. Between Politics and the Themes of Life and Death: Films of the SeventiesChapter 5. Nostalgia and Remorse: Films of the EightiesChapter 6. Grande Finale: Films of the NinetiesConclusionEndnotesBibliographyFilmographyPrizes