A scene from the film "Joanna", 2010, photo by ITI Cinema
Urszula Grabowska was awarded the Silver George award for Best Actress during the closing ceremony at the 33rd edition of the International Film Festival in Moscow on the 2nd of July 2011. The jury chaired by Geraldine Chaplin praised her performance in the film "Joanna" by director Feliks Falk
In addition to Grabowskas' award, the film got the Russian Film Critics and the Cinema Clubs awards. Awarded already with the Best Director and Best Screenplay Prizes at the last year's Gdynia Polish Film Festival, "Joanna", produced by Akson Studio, takes us to the German occupied Kraków in the midst of the Second World War. Joanna, a waitress played by Grabowska, separated from her husband and struggling with fear, rescues a seven-year-old Jewish girl, who managed to escape the Nazi police.
Urszula Grabowska (b. 27 June 1976 in Myślenice) is a film and theatre actress, professionally associated with the Bagatela Theatre in Kraków. In March 2011 she was awarded Best Actress at the Polish Eagle awards for her leading role in "Joanna". She admits that the part is her biggest role to date:
From this role I have a personal satisfaction. Feliks Falk proposal confirmed that I was right in refusing certain roles and waiting for something more.
Before graduating in 2000 from the acting department at the Academy of Dramatic Arts of Kraków - while still a second-year student she made her debut at the Bagatela Theatre as Vera in "Miesiąc na wsi" / "A Month in the Country" directed by Barbara Sass.
The Moscow International Film Festival is one of the biggest film festival in the world, it has been held every second year in July in Moscow, with the Karlovy Vary festival. There were 17 feature films in the Moscow IFF's Main Competition, presented as either the world or international premieres. Also presented at the Moscow IFF was the Polish documentary "Declaration of Immortality" by Marcin Koszalka - a portrait of Piotr "Mad" Korczak, a legend among Polish climbers, who initiated the whole range of various techniques of 'conquering' the walls, and was the first to begin to consider climbing as a sport.
"Joanna" directed by Feliks Falk will have its North American premiere in the programme of the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival 2011 (21 July - 8 August).
Source: press release, Tokfm.pl