POLISH FILM ACADEMY

Her debut was in Kazimierz Kutz’s 1969 sensational Skok [‘The Leap’] where she played alongside Daniel Olbrychski and Marian Opania. In Witold Leszczyński’s Żywot Mateusza/Matthew’s Days she was an intruder from the present, entering the removed-from-time and close-to-nature world of the story’s hero.
In Wajda’s Polowanie na muchy [‘Hunting Flies’] her character Irena’s face in oversized glasses, became a symbol of grotesque, liberated and dangerous femininity.
She presented the full scale of expression in, her then husband, Andrzej Żuławski’s films; Trzecia część nocy/The Third Part of the Night and Diabeł/The Devil, which was kept locked away by the Polish office of censorship for years.
She divided public opinion, causing everlasting disputes as Oleńka Billewiczówna in Potop/The Deluge and later as Izabella Łęcka in the TV-show Lalka/The Doll. She abandoned acting in the ‘80s but returned to the screen in Jacek Borcuch’s Tulipany/Tulips.

Magda Sendecka