HONORARY GUEST WOS 2022
Jean-Jacques Annaud is an internationally renowned filmmaker who was awarded an Oscar for his very first film. He perfectly depicts the relationship between mankind and his surroundings, striving to reveal its strengths and weaknesses.
Since his debut film, Jean-Jacques Annaud has created an exceptional body of work, distinguished by perfectionism and skill applied to the portrayal of a deeply universal and humanist world. Whether about human relationships of the connection between mankind and animals nature, conflict appears as a recurring backdrop to his films.
His first feature film, Black and White in Color, a satirical attack against the warmongering colonialism of European powers in Africa during WWI, awarded an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film (on behalf of the Ivory Coast). Numerous films then followed, in which Jean-Jacques Annaud continued to plough his furrow around the world, his free spirit paying heed to his intuition and desires alone. Quest for Fire, The Name of The Rose, The Bear, Seven Years in Tibet, Stalingrad, to name but a few, illustrate his ability to take risks in order to transport the spectator to the heart of subjects that are often untouched, always intense, such as his latest film - Notre Dame on Fire, a suffocating and heroic immersion in the legendary cathedral's fire and a tribute to its fire fighters.
