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Andrzej Wajda
By far the best-known film director working in Poland, Andrzej Wajda has achieved the status, both in his life and his work, of a symbol for his beleaguered country. The son of a cavalry officer killed in WWII, Wajda joined the Resistance as a teenager. Later, he studied at the Fine Arts Academy in Krakow for three years before transferring in 1950 to the newly opened State Film School in Lodz, where he learned technique directing several short films.