Pieprzyca’s whole career has been connected to Silesia. He filmed his most important films here – from his etude She Is Different (1990) awarded at student festivals to his diploma documentary film and TV debut to his feature film debut as well as the TVP Television Theatre. A documentary film that stands out in his career is entitled By Knockout (1995) – a work focused on the life of the Polish boxing champion Leszek Błażyński, an Olympic medalist and European champion, who couldn’t deal with his life after his sports career ended, so he committed suicide. The director’s TV debut, the first of the series Generation 2000, the film Inferno (2001) – that shows the emotional state of teenagers – high school graduates stepping into adulthood. On the other hand, the film The Feast of St.Barbara (2005) from the TV series Polish Holidays confronts the contemporary portrait of Silesia with the traditional perception of the region that residents of other parts of Poland have about it: the film received the Polish Filmmakers Association Award at the Gdynia Polish Film Festival for a creative portrayal of reality.
Pieprzyca took part in filming the Silesian scenes for the popular series Crime Detectives (episodes based on the high-profile case from the 70s’ on the so-called Vampire from Sosnowiec), which is yet another proof of his attachment to the region, as is his cinematic debut Splinters (2008). A film – based on the lives of young people in contemporary Katowice – that creates a new cinematic tradition: searching for the truth about a dynamically changing region, that confronts the traditional perception of Silesia.
Maciej Pieprzyca’s Silesian stories
Pieprzyca said in an interview:
There is an awful stereotype about this region that has become quite common, that it is a place of poverty, unemployment and lack of prospects. A place where people cannot achieve anything, they always have to lose. This is what people have begun thinking of Silesia. I realized how strong this stereotype was when I started to show my movies. After one screening in Gdynia, a renowned critic claimed that ‘my’ Silesia wasn’t real. The paradox lies is the fact that what I’m showing on screen, that has to do with this region, in which the story is based is a hundred percent real. Even the fakir and Elvis Presley look-alike. – as he told Artur Cichmiński from Stopklatka in an interview.
The critics received this brighter image of Silesia very well. In the review of Splinters Michał Burszta wrote for Filmweb:
Pieprzyca connects silesian magical realism with a story about growing up in the land of Upper Silesia, beloved by Polish filmmakers. (...) Pieprzyca works against stereotypes, without turning neither to triviality, nor cheap journalism.
In his first feature, Splinters, the director put his money on promising young actors. The main parts were played by Karolina Piechota and two of the most talented actors of the young generation: Marcin Hycnar and Antoni Pawlicki. Their roles were among the biggest advantages of the film. Drzazgi are based on characters and actors - wrote Michał Burszta - watching their dilemmas is not like witnessing a parade of mannequins, embodying certain ideas and views, but communing with flesh and blood people.
In 2008, during the Gdynia Film Festival, Maciej Pieprzyca received the Złote Lwy prize for bez newcomer. Also Karolina Piechota and the editor Leszek Starzyński were honoured for their effort.
'Life feels good'
In spite of this success, the audience had to wait five years for Pieprzyca's new film. The director spent these years fighting for his unusual, risky project. Life Feels Good is the story of Mateusz, who was born with cerebral palsy. He can neither walk, nor talk, and the doctors suppose that his brain is not developing in the right manner. For many years the boy fights for a way to communicate with the world.
This was a true story, told for the first time by Ewa Pięta in her documentary Like a Butterfly. When the director died of cancer, Maciej Pieprzyca, who was her friend from college, decided to shoot a film as an homage for the artist. That's how the idea for Life Feels Good was born. The director said in an interview with Orange.pl
At first nobody wanted this film. We had no movie in Poland with an invalid as the main character. "Who would want to watch it?" - people asked, but I believed in this project and I infected the producer and the rest of the crew with this faith.
Life Feels Good turned out to be one of the biggest hits of the last years. During the prestigious Montreal Film Festival the film was awarded three main prizes and at the Gdynia Film Festival it was honoured with Srebrne Lwy and two audience awards. Jiri Menzel, the great Czech director, who was the chair of the Canadian festival jury, admitted that it was one of the most beautiful movies he had ever seen.
In his second feature Pieprzyca displayed artistic maturity and modesty, which was enticing to both critics and the audience. Deciding on a simple form, he hid himself, letting the characters, their truth and ther emotions, take the stage. His film is both extremely moving and funny, escaping from the pitfalls of melodrama.
In 2013 his novel Life Feels Good, on which the drama was based, was also published.
Pieprzyca's latest film - a psychological thriller inspired by real events from the 1970s - is entitled I am a Murderer and it premiered in the Main Competition at the 41. Polish Film Festival in Gdynia in 2016. The jury appreciated the film, honouring it with the Silver Lion award and the award for best screenplay, written by Pieprzyca himself. The film tells the story of Zdzisław Marchwicki (played by Mirosław Haniszewski), an alleged serial killer who was sentenced to death in 1975. Accused of killing 14 women, he became 'an enemy of the state'. The PRL authorities were not interested in the fact that the investigation seemed incomplete and inaccuarate, and some proofs were fabricated. He became a victim of the system, whose death was supposed to calm the society.