Jan S. Kolár

Jan S. Kolár (11 May 1896 – 30 October 1973) was a Czech film director, screenwriter, actor and film historian. He directed a big budget historical film St. Wenceslas.

Jan S. Kolár
Born	(1896-05-11)11 May 1896 Prague, Austria-Hungary
Died	30 October 1973(1973-10-30) (aged 77) Prague, Czechoslovakia
Nationality	Czech
Occupation(s)	Film director Screenwriter Actor

Life

Jan Stanislav Kolár was born Jan Nepomucký Josef Kohn in a Jewish family in Prague. The whole family converted to Christianity and changed their surname to Kolár. He studied law at Charles University and graduated in 1921. His favorite directors of the silent era were D. W. Griffith and Paul Wegener. He started directing films in 1917.

The most important surviving Kolár's films are a crime drama The Poisoned Light, a fantasy horror The Arrival from the Darkness, and a historical film St. Wenceslas. He stopped directing after 1929 and later worked as a studio executive in a nationalized film industry and then as a film historian in Czech Film Archive. He continued to act in supporting roles until his retirement in 1964.^[1]

In 2018 a DVD boxset with seven of Kolár's films was released by Czech Film Archive.^[2]

Selected filmography

Director and screenwriter

Year	Title	Director	Screenwriter	Notes
1917	Polykarp's Winter Adventure	Yes	Yes	Short film
1918	The Oriental Languages' Teacher	Yes	Yes	Short film
1919	Teddy Would Like to Smoke	No	Yes	Short film. Considered lost.
	Lady with the Small Foot	Yes	Yes	Co-directed with Přemysl Pražský.
	Alois Wins the Lottery	No	Yes	Considered lost.
	Chord of Death	Yes	Yes	Considered lost.
1920	The Missing Letters	No	Yes
	The Song of Gold	Yes	Yes	Considered lost.
1921	The Cross by the Brook	Yes	Yes
	The Poisoned Light	Yes	Yes	Co-directed with Karel Lamač.
	The Arrival from the Darkness	Yes	Yes
	The Torn Photograph	Yes	Yes	Short film
1922	The Maharajah's Pleasure	No	Yes	Considered lost.
	The Dead are Living	Yes	Yes	Considered lost.
1925	Parnasie	No	Yes
	The Sun Disciples	No	Yes
1926	The Three Loves of Řina Sezimová	Yes	Yes
1928	Eve's Daughters	No	Yes
1929	St. Wenceslas	Yes	Yes
1937	Blackmailer	No	Yes