Filmmaker Wajda receives Poland's top distinction

WARSAW, Poland: Oscar-winning Polish director Andrzej Wajda received the highest honor the country on Monday to have shaped the culture of the country and in particular the generation of the liberation movement of solidarity through his art.

Wajda was awarded the Order of the White Eagle with a blue sash President Bronislaw Komorowski at a ceremony at the presidential palace. Other Polish filmmakers have also been awarded various medals below.

Komorowski thanked them for addressing difficult questions about Poland and to help bring democracy to the nation in 1989.

He specifically thanked Wajda because "through his art he has served as major causes. I thank him shaped my generation, that of solidarity" in the 1980, which overthrew Communism.

The 85-year-old Wajda, leaning on a cane, said the main goal of Poland's cinema has always been to be close to the public and show that its roots and its past.

In 2000 Wajda was awarded an honorary Oscar for his lifetime achievement in cinema. His films often artistically refined talked about key moments or painful history of Poland and their effect on the lives of individuals.

The Order of White Eagle, more civilians and the military award was established in 1705, but was abandoned for most of the time when Poland was carved up by neighboring powers in the 19th century. It was completely restored in 1992, in the early days of democracy