Peter Kassovitz
Born in Budapest in 1938,
Peter Kassovitz has lived through some of the same experiences as the characters in JAKOB THE LIAR. As a child, he wore the yellow Star of David on his clothing. At the age of five, he saw his mother and father taken away to concentration camps and was hidden with a Catholic family. Miraculously, both of his parents survived the camps and returned to Budapest when the war was over. At 18, during the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, Peter emigrated from Budapest to Paris. These experiences have informed his filmmaking and his writing throughout his career.
In Paris, Kassovitz worked as an assistant camera operator, then a cameraman. He began directing in 1959 working in many different kinds of films (animation, industrial, commercial, documentaries, television). Since 1976, he has directed and written more than 30 feature and television films in France. His 1990 telefilm Stirn and Stern is a comedy about a Jewish family and an anti-Semite during the Nazi occupation of France. Other titles include Bonjour Tristesse, La Rancon du Chien, Control d'Identite and Faussaires. He has directed two feature films in France, Room for Tomorrow, the story of a Jewish family, and the black comedy Droles d'Oiseaux. In addition to writing and directing films, Peter Kassovitz is the author of two French novels, Les Femmes D'Abord and Les Milles et Un Raison de Desesperer.
Note: This profile was written in or before 2000.
Peter Kassovitz Facts
Selected Filmography
