Filip Pławiak

Friday, October 17

Filip Pławiak is lead actor in Jacek Bromski’s film, One Way Ticket to the Moon/Bilet na Księżyc. Actor Pławiak is staying busy and is featured in several new Polish film releases. Mr. Pławiak is coming to Austin following a guest appearance at the Los Angeles Polish Film Festival. This is Mr. Pławiak’s first trip to Texas.

Zbigniew Banaś

Thursday, October 16 – Friday, October 17

Zbigniew Banaś is a film critic, teacher, translator, and a radio and television journalist. Banaś reviews films for the Kino, a monthly magazine in Poland.  He is affiliated with WPNA (1490 AM) and WNVR (1030 AM) radio stations in Chicago, and with Chicago’s Polvision TV (Ch. 24.4).

Banaś is an instructor in International Film at Loyola University in Chicago, teaches film-related classes for the Road Scholar Program, and conducts film discussions at Talk Cinema and the Sinai Congregation.

Banaś is the co-founder of the Polish Film Festival of America and serves as the Master of Ceremonies of the Polish Film Festivals in Chicago and Los Angeles. He is an accredited journalist at over 20 film festivals, including Cannes, Berlin, Toronto, and Sundance.  He is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association.

Mr. Banaś introduced the festival films and moderated a Q&A session with the guest actor.

Dr. Ian Hancock

Sunday, October 19

Dr. Ian Hancock (Romani: Yanko le Redžosko) is a linguist, Romani scholar, and political advocate. He was born and raised in England, and is one of the main contributors in the field of Romani studies.

He is director of the Program of Romani Studies and the Romani Archives and Documentation Center at The University of Texas at Austin, where he has been a professor of English, linguistics and Asian studies since 1972. He has represented the Romani people at the United Nations and served as a member of the US Holocaust Memorial Council under President Bill Clinton, who Hancock claims has Romani ancestry. He also represented the Romani people at the 1997 Rafto Prize award.

Dr. Ian Hancock kindly agreed to introduce thefilm “Papusza” based on a true life story of a Roma woman, a poet, in Poland. 

Dr. Gilbert Rappaport

Saturday, October 18

Dr. Gil Rappaport has been a strong supporter of the Austin Polish Film Festival and the Austin Polish Society from their inception. Our audiences benefited from his insightful presentations and sketches of a historical background to the films that otherwise would have been hard to decipher for viewers unfamiliar with the intricacies of Polish culture and its convoluted history.
Dr. Rappaport speaks fluent Polish (he is not a native speaker!) and Russian. For the last 35 years he was a professor of Slavic Languages  at the University of Texas at Austin. His interests include Linguistic theories, structure of Russian and Polish, Polish culture, language and public discourse, and the music of Shostakovich . He is an accomplished classical pianist.
Dr. Rappaport is an elected member of Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences of America.

This year, Dr. Rappaport agreed to introduce a biopic, “Walesa. Man of Hope” by Andrzej Wajda.