Janusz Majewski
Janusz Marian Majewski (5 August 1931 – 10 January 2024) was a Polish film director and screenwriter. Majewski married Zofia Nasierowska, who was a noted portrait photographer. He died on 10 January 2024, at the age of 92.
Works
Night Train
Two strangers, Jerzy and Marta, accidentally end up holding tickets for the same sleeping chamber on an overnight train to the Baltic Sea coast. Also on board is Marta's spurned lover, who will not leave her alone. When the police enter the train in search of a murderer on the lam, rumors fly and everything seems to point toward one of the main characters as the culprit.
Release Date1959-09-06
Charactersd Janusz (uncredited)
Vote Count97
Koniec nocy
A group of young Łódź hoodlums spends their time shoplifting, partying and drinking heavily, until they are faced with serious consequences of their reckless behaviour.
Release Date1957-12-21
Charactersd Man buying theatre tickets from Mały (uncredited)
Vote Count6
Capital, or How to Make Money in Poland
A sociologist nearing middle-aged returns to Poland after several years of giving lectures abroad. The changing economy of the country and business successes of the people around him inspire him to venture out into the deep and unpredictable world of capitalism himself.
Release Date1990-02-12
Charactersd Janusz Majewski
Vote Count7
Samosiuk. The Independent Film Republic
The film is a portrait of Zygmunt Samosiuk, a great forgotten cinematographer, who died in 1983. As a director of photography he worked on such films as The Birch Wood, Landscape Afterthe Battle and Austeria. He introduced, among others, hand‑held camera shots, colour lights and shooting at minimum exposure. Reminiscences of his colleagues and friends, including Andrzej Wajda and Piotr Szulkin, show a gifted artist and a modest man who valued his work above all.
Release Date2012-05-30
Charactersd Self
Vote Count1
I Have Lived Seventeen Times
The main character of "Żyłem siedemnaście razy" reflects on his childhood in Gwoździec and tells a story about the beginning of his career as a filmmaker.
Release Date2009-01-01
Charactersd Self
Dream is Life Itself. A Portrait of Film Director Janusz Majewski
Janusz Majewski, an outstanding film director seen through the eyes of his friend, Stefan Szlachtycz. The passion for literature and film in Janusz Majewski's life is united by the motif of a dream - the film's title alludes to both Pedro Calderon de la Barca's drama and cinema as a dream factory.
Release Date2013-01-01
Charactersd Self
A więc wojna!
Release Date2019-08-31
Charactersd Self
Theatre Macabre
Horror legend Christopher Lee hosts this anthology in the tradition of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, each half-hour episode adapting a story from a classic author, with tales by Edgar Allen Poe, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Ambrose Bierce, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Oscar Wilde.
Release Date1971-10-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Episode Count3
Vote Count3
Devilish Education
In a rural Catholic village, young Gosia tends cattle and lives an innocent, sheltered life. One summer day, while bathing in the river, she is unknowingly observed by a mysterious painter. When he later reveals his portrait of her, Gosia’s initial shame gives way to curiosity, drawing her into an awakening of desire and a confrontation with temptation.
Release Date1995-01-11
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count21
Lost Night
Returning from Rome, Warsaw writer Wacław Kisielecki's car breaks down late one evening on a country road, forcing him and his chauffeur, Konstanty, to seek lodging at a nearby manor house. Its owner is a young man, Jan, who has been managing the dilapidated estate since his mother's death. All that remains of the former estate are the manor house, a vast orchard, and two servants: Stanisław, the caretaker, and his beautiful young wife, Faustyna, who runs Jan's household.
Release Date1974-02-20
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count4
Napoleon
The miniseries charts Napoleon Bonaparte’s career from his return after the Egyptian campaign to his downfall and exile on Elba, portraying his political maneuvering, military ambition, and complex relationships with key figures such as Talleyrand, Fouché, Murat, Tsar Alexander, Joséphine de Beauharnais, and Countess Marie Walewska.
Release Date1991-01-11
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Episode Count6
Vote Count1
The Gorgon Case
In 1931, just before the New Year, in a house of architect Henryk Zaremba scream rips the night. The daughter of Zaremba is found killed in her bedroom, obviously killed with a pickaxe. The police arrives and starts the investigation. Rita Gorgonova, the governess of the girl and also lover of Zaremba becomes the main suspect.
Release Date1977-11-25
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count8
I Am Burning!
Ja gorę! tells the story of a Pogorzelski nobleman who settles in a ruined castle in Samsonów, determined to restore it, only to be haunted by the ghost of its former owner. A parody of gothic horror literature and cinema, the short is based on a tale by Henryk Rzewuski and was produced as part of the Polish television series Opowieści niezwykłe (1967–1968).
Release Date1968-01-21
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
Vote Count4
Jazz Outsider
Release Date2022-05-31
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Jazz in Poland
Performances by Poland's most acclaimed jazz bands, punctuated by short interviews conducted by German music journalist Joachim-Ernst Berendt. Appearing consecutively are: Warsaw Stompers, Namysłowski Quartet, Andrzej Trzaskowski Quintet, Krzysztof Komeda Quintet, Bossa Nova Combo and Wróblewski Quartet. The concerts are crowned by the All Star Session, a joint finale with all the performers and the song Family Blues.
Release Date1964-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count1
Królowa Bona
Release Date1980-12-24
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Episode Count12
Vote Count6
The Lodger
A pleasant, open-faced young man comes to live in a boarding house with three peculiar women.
Release Date1967-01-07
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count6
Kapelusz
A Silent broad comedy about upper class life
Release Date1961-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Blue Room
In 19th-century Poland, a young couple sets out for a weekend in the countryside. On the train they meet a mysterious Englishman traveling to the same destination, whose presence arouses their suspicions. Choosing to lodge in the room beside his—the fateful Blue Room—they soon find themselves drawn into a web of intrigue and menace.
Release Date1965-01-01
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
Bar Atlantic
Release Date1996-12-14
DepartmentCreator
JobCreator
Ostatni klezmer
Release Date2017-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Eccentrics, the Sunny Side of the Street
In late 1950s Poland, jazzman Fabian returns from England and forms a swing big band that quickly rises to fame. Their glamorous new singer, the enigmatic Modesta, becomes both the group’s star and Fabian’s love interest. As their success begins to resemble a Hollywood musical, the authorities take a growing interest in their world of music and romance.
Release Date2016-01-15
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count10
The Black Dress
A stark, two-character chamber drama about Joanna, a middle-aged woman who returns from the camps after World War II. Seeking out her deceased husband’s mother, she cannot bring herself to reveal the truth about his fate. Instead, she invents a story to spare the grieving woman further pain. What begins as a compassionate lie soon entangles Joanna in an ever-growing web of deception, as more people who know the truth become drawn into her fragile fiction.
Release Date1967-06-04
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count1
Bridge
A tense, compact adaptation of Ambrose Bierce’s “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” Bridge (Polish title Most) recreates the surreal final moments of a condemned man awaiting execution during the American Civil War. In Majewski’s hands, the familiar twist — reality folding into illusion — becomes a lean, visual meditation on death, perception, and the fragility of hope.
Release Date1960-01-01
DepartmentWriting
JobWriter
First Pavilion
A young scientist is kidnapped and taken to a house where his former mentor, a professor, is conducting experiments on shrinking humans.
Release Date1968-09-02
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count4
Mała matura 1947
Release Date2013-05-08
DepartmentCreator
JobCreator
An Epitaph for Barbara Radziwill
A historical drama about Barbara Radziwiłł, whose controversial love affair and marriage with King Sigismund II Augustus defied political opposition in 16th-century Poland. The film follows their romance, Barbara’s untimely death, and her posthumous return to Vilnius, framed through the king’s memories of his beloved queen.
Release Date1983-03-14
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count6
Avatar: The Exchange of Souls
Count Olgierd Łabiński lives in Paris with his beloved wife, but their quiet life is disturbed by the arrival of Octavius de Saville, a former admirer of the Countess from her days in Florence. Obsessed with possessing her, Octavius seeks out Dr. Cherbonneau, a sinister figure dabbling in Eastern teachings of reincarnation. Through the doctor’s occult science, Octavius attempts a dangerous “exchange of souls,” scheming to inhabit the Count’s body and win the woman he desires.
Release Date1964-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count17
Deserter's Gold
"Deserter's Gold", the sequel to the very popular "The Deserters", is a rich war comedy, skipping humorously around the more serious dangers of a war. Deserters Gold takes place during World War II, while the first film happened during WWI. The heroes' mission is to rob a Nazi-run bank in Poland for gold that will buy military supplies for the Polish Underground.
Release Date1998-12-03
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count18
The Boarded Window
In a secluded forest house, a woman tormented by anxiety and paranoia lives with her helpless husband. Their fragile peace shatters when she suddenly falls ill and appears to die, setting the stage for a tense and haunting drama of isolation and dread.
Release Date1971-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count3
Play
A boy plays alone in a well of a big city yard. His mother, being in their tenement flat, passes him an empty bottle using a string. The boy has to go to a shop. His alcohol fun begins – at an off-licence shop, at a purchasing centre, at a gate.
Release Date1961-01-02
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Podróżni jak inni
A group of Polish communists in Paris arrives in Poland to fight against the Nazis.
Release Date1970-03-27
DepartmentArt
JobSupervising Art Director
Vote Count1
Fleischer's Album
A documentary short constructed from the photo album of a German officer, tracing his movements across multiple World War II fronts. The film transforms private souvenirs into stark testimony, exposing how personal mementos intersect with the broader history of the war.
Release Date1962-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Duel
"Duel" describes the clash of two athletes, shot putters David Davis and Alfred Sosgórnik.
Release Date1964-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Mark of Cain
In 1866, as Austria faces war with Prussia, 19-year-old Ludvík Machl joins a secret Czech resistance group. When he is caught with stolen funds and a weapon, the police commissioner spares him from prison on the condition that he work as an informant. Trapped by fear and betrayal, Ludvík is forced down a path that leads inexorably toward his own destruction.
Release Date1989-11-27
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count1
Black Mercedes
In Nazi-occupied Warsaw, an investigator tries to unravel the mysterious murder of a prominent attorney's wife.
Release Date2019-10-04
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count37
Roundabout
A man enters a restaurant and, after trying and failing to attract the attentions of the waiter, an absurd battle of wills commences.
Release Date1958-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Uśmiech bez sensu
Release Date1957-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
H.M. Deserters
Set in 1918, this World War I drama follows a group of Austro-Hungarian soldiers—Czechs, Jews, Italians, and others—confined in a provincial barracks under German officers. Subjected to the cruelty of a sadistic lieutenant, they rebel, humiliate him, and later attempt escape. Disguised as guards for veterinary surgeons in Budapest, the deserters are eventually recaptured and returned for court-martial, forced once more to face their tormentor.
Release Date1986-09-22
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count36
Rzeczywistość
The 1937 trial of communist journalists, working for the same student magazine in Vilnius, is shown through the tragic life of the paper's young collaborator Julek Szulc.
Release Date1961-04-28
DepartmentArt
JobProduction Design
Vote Count1
Opus Jazz
A documentary portrait of the Kurylewicz Quintet at work in the recording studio, Opus Jazz captures the stop-and-start process of rehearsal before the musicians lock into rhythm and achieve full improvisational flow. Majewski’s film highlights both the discipline and spontaneity of modern jazz in 1960s Poland.
Release Date1963-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Szkice węglem
The dark drama of a peasant family from the second half of the 19th century: Seduced by a municipal clerk (in exchange for a promise to release her husband from military service), the woman dies at the hands of her jealous husband.
Release Date1957-11-25
DepartmentArt
JobProduction Design
Vote Count1
Zbigniew Namyslowski Quartet
A documentary record of the stage performance of the piece titled "Piętawka" played by the Zbigniew Namysłowski quartet: the leader (alto saxophone), Włodzimierz Gulgowski (grand piano), Tadeusz Wójcik (double bass), Czesław Bartkowski (drums). The modern composition corresponds to the geometric, rhythmic stage design in the background. The film is part of a bigger project - a music documentary titled "Jazz in Poland" directed by Janusz Majewski.
Release Date1964-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count1
Nadziei za dwadzieścia złotych
Release Date1957-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Salty Rose
The happiness that has passed away will never return - this is exactly what a young Polish man learns when, in the immediate post-war period, he recalls how he fell in love with a charming Jewish girl before the outbreak of the war. He manages to find her, only she is already married and has a child.
Release Date1983-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count5
Kalosze szczęścia
Two fairies, Terencja and Felicja are in posession of the Lucky Rain Boots, which they intend to give to the most deserving person in the city of Kraków. However, they consistently fall into the wrong hands, creating a multitude of absurd and comedic situations.
Release Date1958-10-20
DepartmentArt
JobProduction Design
Vote Count6
A Hymn on the Death of the Young
A surrealistic portrait of restaurant guests as seen by an otherworldly visitor who has the ability to read people’s subconscious.
Release Date1973-01-01
DepartmentArt
JobArt Department Assistant
Hotel Pacific
Set in the early 1930s, a young man finds a job as a dishwasher in a hotel and quickly works his way up the ladder. Loosely based on the novel by Henryk Worcell.
Release Date1975-11-27
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count28
Blekitny pokój
DepartmentCreator
JobCreator
Vote Count1
The Rite of Passage
Ludwik starts one of the best high schools in Krakow. His life changes with a growing storm of conflicting emotions. First love infatuations, sexual contacts, a rebellion against unjust authorities and the desire to imitate his idol, Marek, an older boy who who fought in the Warsaw Uprising in 1944.
Release Date2010-04-09
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count8
Lesson of a Dead Language
An officer stationed in a remote Ukranian outpost at the end of the First World War is dying of consumption. Suffering from feverish dreams and hallucinations, he begins to collect religious art and attends seances.
Release Date1979-09-06
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count2
The Moonlit Road
Julian, a young man who came back home after years of studying abroad finds his life in turmoil after falling for his stepmother, while his dead mother's spirit haunts the family house, intent on revenge.
Release Date1973-01-04
DepartmentArt
JobSupervising Art Director
Vote Count3
Powrót po śmierć
One June evening, a Krakow prostitute nicknamed Rączka is accosted by a bloody man who wants to spend the night with her. The girl agrees, but when the next day she learns that a gruesome crime has been committed near the place where the mysterious customer accosted her, she reports the night's meeting to the police.
Release Date1987-12-02
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
Markheim
During a botched robbery, Markheim murders an elderly antique dealer. Consumed by guilt and confusion, he begins to lose his grip on reality until a spectral dog leads him to a mysterious figure who knows all his secrets. Based on the short story by Robert Louis Stevenson.
Release Date1972-01-28
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
Vote Count1
System
An adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s tale The System of Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether, transposed to a contemporary setting. A couple visits a remote asylum where the woman knows the staff, only to discover that the institution is overrun and the lines between doctors and patients have collapsed.
Release Date1981-02-09
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
Vote Count1
Hospital
Confined to a hospital room, a seemingly healthy man endures a surreal night as his space is invaded by a procession of bizarre, dreamlike visitors—many linked to the imagery of railroads. Blurring reality with hallucination, the film transforms the ward into a stage for nightmarish encounters.
Release Date1962-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count1
The Criminal Who Stole a Crime
Retired police captain Siwy recounts to a reporter how he undertook a final, private investigation into the suspicious death of Ewa Salm, known as “Princess.” Though her testimony had secured a conviction, Siwy doubted the man’s guilt and set out to uncover the real killer—risking his own life to see justice done.
Release Date1969-10-07
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count4
Mistrz tańca
A mysterious man takes a writer back to the 19th century, where they meet Death.
Release Date1969-04-23
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
Vote Count3
777
A young bus driver's life changes after he meets a woman that later becomes a victim of a road accident.
Release Date1973-03-02
DepartmentArt
JobSupervising Art Director
The Office
Juliusz Starzewski goes to Rome to seek justice on behalf of his father.
Release Date1969-12-14
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Do widzenia wczoraj. Dwie krótkie komedie o zmianie systemu
1. A ring of retired provincial PRL dignitaries plots to steal their party’s banner from the Museum of Communism as an ideological relic, only to have their scheme complicated when one conspirator’s son enlists an Italian collector in a profit-seeking joint venture. 2. A young homeless couple squatting in an unoccupied Balaton dacha is caught by the elderly ex-communist official who now runs a Budapest nightclub—and agrees to keep silent about their trespass in exchange for forcing them into a public “wedding night” performance for his patrons.
Release Date1993-01-01
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count1
Venus of Ille
Janusz Majewski adapts Prosper Mérimée’s 1835 tale of the same name, centering on a mysterious statue unearthed in a provincial town. The figure, sculpted as a tormented woman, becomes an ominous presence during a wedding celebration. When the groom impulsively slips his ring onto the statue’s finger—and cannot remove it—the joyous occasion descends into a nightmarish spiral of superstition, obsession, and the uncanny.
Release Date1969-04-30
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
After Season
A mysterious man visits a Masurian guesthouse after the season, where he develops a closer relationship with three female residents.
Release Date2006-03-31
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count6
The Rotter Case
A teenage boy from a respectable family, Stanisław Czajkowski, dies in mysterious circumstances in a Krakow guesthouse. His brother-in-law, Count Maksymilian Rotter, married to Stanisław's older sister, Ksawera, is accused of the murder.
Release Date1987-07-15
DepartmentWriting
JobWriter
Jealousy and Medicine
In 1930s, a doctor has an affair with the wife of a wealthy industrialist in Poland.
Release Date1973-09-25
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count12
Associate Professor H.
Professor H., obsessed with replacing humans through artificial beings, has created Traumer—an unsettlingly perfect assistant whose cold efficiency conceals an unnatural origin. Believing he has found the ideal subject for his next experiment, the professor plots to transplant Traumer’s brain with that of a distinguished scientist. But the plan unravels when Traumer proves far less obedient, and far more uncanny, than expected.
Release Date1968-08-30
DepartmentWriting
JobScreenplay
Vote Count2
Lokis: A Manuscript of Professor Wittembach
A pastor and ethnographer visits a remote corner of 19th-century Lithuania where folk customs associated with the area's pagan past still have a hold on the population.
Release Date1970-09-25
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count23
Love in an Underground Passage
Release Date2007-02-14
DepartmentDirecting
JobDirector
Vote Count1