The Champion (2020 film)

The Champion (Polish: Mistrz, "The Master"), released in some English-speaking countries as The Champion of Auschwitz, is a 2020 Polish sports drama film written and directed by Maciej Barczewski. It stars Piotr Głowacki as Tadeusz Pietrzykowski, a real-life Polish boxer who became famous for his nearly undefeated strings of victories in the Nazi concentration camps.[2][3][4][5][6] The film also stars Rafal Zawierucha, Marcin Czarnik and Marian Dziedziel. The music was composed by Bartosz Chajdecki.[2][3] This is the first full-length movie directed by Barczewski.[3]

The Champion
Directed byMaciej Barczewski
Written byMaciej Barczewski
Produced by
  • Krzysztof Szpetmański
  • Leszek Starzyński
Starring
  • Marianna Pawlisz
  • Piotr Głowacki
  • Grzegorz Małecki
  • Marcin Bosak
CinematographyWitold Płóciennik
Edited byLeszek Starzyński
Music byBartosz Chajdecki
Production
company
Iron Films
Distributed byGalapagos Films
Release date
CountryPoland
LanguagePolish
Box office$43,663[1]

The film premiered at the Gdynia Polish Film Festival on 8 December 2020.[7]

The Champion is notable for being the first film for which a foreign-language version (in English) was created in which the actors' facial movements are modified so that they appear to be speaking that language. The work was done using a technology similar to deepfake, proprietary to the Tel Aviv-based tech startup Adapt Entertainment, which bought the English-language distribution rights for The Champion so that it could serve as a proof of concept for its technology.[8]

Plot

The movie tells the story of Tadeusz Pietrzykowski, a real-life Polish boxer who became famous for his nearly undefeated strings of victories in the Nazi concentration camps.[2][3][4][5][6]

Development

The film was announced in 2019.[3] The shooting finished in January 2020.[2] The movie was initially scheduled for release for 16 October 2020[9][10] but has been delayed with the new release date given as March 2021.[11] The delay was likely caused by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Polish cinemas.[11]

Cast

English-language version

The Tel Aviv-based startup Adapt Entertainment is based around proprietary machine learning process, named Plato, that uses AI to modify actors' faces within film and television shows in order to make it appear that those actors are speaking another language, as a substitute for dubbing.[12] The software is similar to but distinct from deepfake technology. The company bought the English-language distribution rights to The Champion at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival for $100,000, after the film had seen financial success in Poland, as a proof of concept for its process. They then hired much of the film's original cast to be filmed at a studio speaking the film's dialogue in English, and used the resulting audio, as well as a combination of the old and new footage as training material, to infer the characters' facial movements to match the new dialogue.[13][8][14]

Director Barczewski was supportive of the new version, saying he had wanted to additionally film The Champion in English but could not afford to do it.[14]

References
  1. "The Champion (2020)". Box Office Mojo.
  2. "Koniec zdjęć do filmu "Mistrz" o legendarnym polskim pięściarzu". kultura.onet.pl. 24 January 2020. Archived from the original on 2020-06-13. Retrieved 2020-10-08.
  3. "Powstanie "Mistrz" – film o legendarnym polskim pięściarzu z Auschwitz". www.tvp.info (in Polish). 20 November 2019. Archived from the original on 2020-10-01. Retrieved 2020-10-08.
  4. ""Mistrz" - film o legendarnym pięściarzu "Teddy'm" będzie miał premierę jesienią". histmag.org. Archived from the original on 2020-11-25. Retrieved 2020-10-08.
  5. "Incredible true story of boxing champ who fought for his life in Auschwitz turned into major new film". www.thefirstnews.com. Archived from the original on 2020-11-28. Retrieved 2020-10-08.
  6. ""Mistrz". Historia Polaka, który zdobył tytuł mistrza wszechwag obozu koncentracyjnego Auschwitz-Birkenau". gazetapl (in Polish). Archived from the original on 17 July 2020. Retrieved 14 July 2020.
  7. "FNE at Gdynia Polish FF 2020: The Champion". FilmNewEurope.com. Archived from the original on 2021-05-09. Retrieved 2021-06-04.
  8. Baysinger, Tim (April 13, 2022). "Adapt Entertainment hopes to boost foreign film market with A.I. dubbing". Axios.
  9. "Dzięki walkom na ringu Tadeusz Pietrzykowski ocalił swoje życie. Powstaje film o słynnym "Teddym"!". Viva.pl (in Polish). 7 July 2020. Archived from the original on 2020-08-08. Retrieved 2020-10-08.
  10. Redakcja (4 February 2020). "Bokser z Auschwitz. Bielsko-Biała upamiętni Tadeusza Teddy'ego Pietrzykowskiego". Dziennik Zachodni (in Polish). Archived from the original on 14 July 2020. Retrieved 14 July 2020.
  11. "Premiera "Mistrza" przełożona na 2021 rok". film.interia.pl (in Polish). Archived from the original on 2020-10-14. Retrieved 2020-10-08.
  12. "The Neural Rendering of The Champion". fxguide. 2022-04-11. Retrieved 2022-09-04.
  13. Tangcay, Jazz (2022-08-26). "How 'The Champion' Could Bolster the Foreign Language Film Market Through AI". Variety. Retrieved 2022-09-04.
  14. Welk, Brian (April 11, 2022). "How a Polish Film's Use of AI to Create an English Version Could Bolster the Foreign Movie Market". Yahoo!.
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