A showcase of Roman Polanski's rarely screened short films with live music by experimental electroacoustic duo Sza/Za will premiere at BAMcinématek tonight and then tour the U.S. The project will pay tribute to the Polish jazz pioneer Krzysztof Komeda, Polanski's long time collaborator in Europe and Hollywood. It had its international premiere at Unsound Festival 2010, just two weeks ago.
Between 1958 and 1962, the acclaimed director and Academy Award® winner, Roman Polanski made a series of short films, most at the renowned Polish Lodz Film School, from playful filmmaking exercises: Murder (1957) and Teeth Smile (1957), the metaphorical Break Up the Dance (1957) and Mammals (1962) to his award winning film, Two Men and a Wardrobe (1958). These films reveal Polanski's surreal and dark style, his masterful storytelling ability and his restless search for the truth about human nature, however crooked and evil it would turn out to be. The grotesque and often disturbing world of his short films, and his meticulous, clean direction are traits that would be later developed in such masterpieces as Rosemary's Baby, Chinatown and The Pianist.
Sza/Za is Pawel Szamburski and Patryk Zakrocki - musicians, improvisers and promoters of culture in the Warsaw music and independent art scene since 1999. Their music is a unique mix of noise and silence, pop and contemporary chamber music, beauty and ugliness, of sophisticated wisdom and pure, naïve thoughtlessness. Using clarinet, violin, analogue loop stations and subtle effects, the musicians seek to collapse those oppositions, attempting to free both the stage and the audience from the bonds of rules and cultural expectations.
This project is presented by the Polish Cultural Institute in New York, in association with Unsound Festival, with additional support from the Trust for Mutual Understanding and Janus Films. Partners include: BAMcinématek, Cornell Cinema, Alamo Drafthouse, Boulder Theater, Cinefamily, San Francisco Film Society, Seattle International Film Festival, Society for the Arts and National Gallery of Art.

For further details please head to the website of the Polish Cultural Institute in New York.