Pavel Branko facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Pavel Branko
|
|
|---|---|
Branko in 1977
|
|
| Born | 27 April 1921 |
| Died | 17 August 2020 (aged 99) |
| Nationality | Slovak |
| Occupation | film critic |
Pavel Branko (born April 27, 1921 – died August 17, 2020) was a very important film critic from Slovakia. He also studied film, translated many books, and wrote articles about how language is used. People called him "the top film critic in Slovakia."
After a time when the government controlled everything (called "real socialism"), Pavel Branko received many awards. These awards honored his life and all the work he did. His life story shows how much the history of Czechoslovakia affected people. Branko was married to Emilia Brankova.
Contents
Pavel Branko's Life and Work
Early Life and Education
Pavel Branko was born on a French ship near Trieste, a port city in Italy. His birth was recorded in Trieste. His father was from Slovakia and had Jewish roots, but converted to Protestantism. His mother was Russian.
Pavel spent his childhood in a place called Hatshava. In 1931, he moved to Bratislava, the capital city. He went to high school there from 1932 to 1940. After finishing high school, he started university in 1940. However, the next year, he was not allowed to continue because his father had Jewish heritage. He then worked a few short jobs until the summer of 1942.
Fighting for Freedom and Imprisonment
During World War II, Slovakia was ruled by a government led by Jozef Tiso. This government was very unfair to Jewish people. Because of this, Pavel Branko joined a secret group that was fighting against the government. This group was called the Communist Party, and it was the main group fighting against the unfair government in Slovakia at that time.
In June 1942, Pavel was arrested with four other people from his group. He was given a life sentence in prison.
From 1942 to 1945, Branko was held as a political prisoner in different prisons in Slovakia. In early 1945, the government was worried that the Red Army (Soviet soldiers) would free the prisoners. So, they made a deal with the German secret police (Gestapo). The prisoners were officially released but were immediately handed over to the Gestapo. This is how Pavel Branko ended up in the Mauthausen concentration camp in February 1945. He spent three very difficult months there until the U.S. army freed him in May 1945.
Becoming a Film Critic and Translator
After he was freed, Pavel Branko started working as a translator. He translated books and philosophical texts from English, Russian, and German. From 1945 to 1949, he became less and less happy with how the Communist Party was actually working. Because of this, he publicly left the party in 1949. This had many consequences for him.
However, because he had fought against the unfair government and had been a political prisoner, he was still respected. When he started writing about films, he quickly became a well-known film critic.
Between 1948 and 1952, his film reviews were published in many newspapers and magazines. But in 1952, the government became very strict about what people could say. Pavel Branko did not agree with these strict rules. He decided to stop being a film critic and moved to a quiet cabin in the High Tatras mountains. There, he focused only on translating books.
In 1956, things became a bit more relaxed in the country. Pavel Branko returned to Bratislava. He was invited to work as a film editor for a new magazine called Film a divadlo (Film and Theater).
From 1956 onwards, Branko focused on documentary films. He often went to film festivals and sometimes even served as a judge. He published his reviews and essays in many Slovak and Czech magazines and newspapers. He was also published in other countries like France, Yugoslavia, Poland, Germany, Sweden, and the Soviet Union. People really started to notice his writing in the 1960s.
In 1968, during a time of more freedom called the Prague Spring, Branko taught a class for new screenwriters. He also traveled to Germany with other Slovak filmmakers to show films that were a bit different from what the government usually allowed.
Even though he was a respected film critic, Branko continued to translate books. In 1967, he won awards for his translation of a famous book by Maxim Gorky.
Difficult Times: Blacklisting
In 1970, Pavel Branko decided to leave his job as film editor. This was because he disagreed with the new strict rules the government was putting in place. This period was called "normalization," meaning the government wanted to make everything "normal" again after the freedoms of the Prague Spring.
Because he had supported the Prague Spring movement, he was later officially "blacklisted." This meant he was prevented from working as a film critic from 1972 to 1989. He was also stopped from translating books from 1972 to 1978. In 1973, at age 52, he was forced to retire. During this time, he could sometimes publish film essays on topics that were not controversial. He did this by using the names of his friends as a cover.
Later Years
From 1990 to 2007, after the strict government control ended, Pavel Branko started publishing film criticism again. His articles appeared in many journals and newspapers, and he also spoke on Radio Free Europe.
Awards and Recognition
Pavel Branko received many honors for his work:
- In 1997, he was given an honorary doctorate degree from the Academy of Performing Arts.
- In 2000, he received several awards for his collected film reviews, which were published in three books called Straty a nálezy (Lost and Found).
- Also in 2000, he received the Zlatá kamera (Golden Camera) award at a film festival. He also got a special diploma from the Prime Minister.
- In the same year, he won the "Prize of Slovak Film Criticism" for his book Straty a nálezy, 1948 – 98.
- In 2007, he received the Slnko v sieti (Sun in the Net) Award for his achievements throughout his life.
Documentary Films About Pavel Branko
- In 2009, a filmmaker named Zuzana Piussi made a documentary about Pavel Branko called A Hero of our Time. The title hints that Branko saw himself as someone who "swims against the current." This means he didn't fit in with the strict governments of his time.
- In 2010, another film about Pavel Branko was made for a Slovak TV series called GEN (Gallery of National Elite).
Death
Pavel Branko passed away in August 2020. He was 99 years old.
Selected Books by Pavel Branko
Pavel Branko wrote several books, mostly about film and language:
- Od začiatkov po prah zrelosti slovenský film 1945-1970 (From the Beginnings to Maturity – Slovak Cinema 1945-1970)
- Mikrodramaturgia dokumentarizmu (Micro-dramaturgy of Documentary Film) – This book shares his ideas about documentary films.
- Straty a nálezy I, II, III (Lost and Found I, II, III) – These are collections of his film reviews.
- Proti prúdu (Against the Current) – This book is about his life and how he saw society.
- Úklady jazyka (Schemes of Language), Úskalia a slasti jazyka (Cliffs and Delights of Language), and Úlety a istoty jazyka (Somersaults and Certainties of Language) – These books are about the interesting and sometimes tricky ways language is used.
Some Books Translated by Pavel Branko
Pavel Branko translated many important books from other languages into Slovak:
- Maxim Gorky’s Klim Samgin
- Alexey Tolstoy’s The Road to Calvary
- Otar Chiladze’s Where are you going, man...
- Jack London’s The Call of the Wild, White Fang, and The Sea Wolf
- Bertolt Brecht’s Refugee Conversations
