We can already witness a crystalline vision in Zanussi’s debut feature as he gives us an existential take on what makes one continue to live the life that one now lives, as two physicist friends deliberate on their vastly different life paths.
Review #2,854
Dir. Krzysztof Zanussi
1969 | Poland | Drama | 74 min | 1.37:1 | Polish
Not rated – likely to be PG
Cast: Barbara Wrzesinska, Jan Myslowicz, Andrzej Zarnecki
Plot: Jan and Marek used to study physics together but after graduation their paths were different. Jan got married and moved to the countryside. Marek stayed in Warsaw and now wants to persuade Jan to follow his path.
Awards: Official Selection (Cannes)
Source: TVCO
Accessibility Index
Subject Matter: Moderate – Different Life Paths; Friendship
Narrative Style: Straightforward
Pace: Slightly Slow
Audience Type: Slightly Arthouse
Viewed: MUBI
Spoilers: No
From the very beginning of Krzysztof Zanussi’s feature filmmaking career, we can already witness a crystalline vision, one that radiates throughout his body of work.
With The Structure of Crystal, the Polish master gives us an existential take on what makes one continue to live the life that one now lives. It is a difficult question and there is usually no rational answer.
Zanussi asks us to reflect further by situating this ‘problem’ in the lives of two friends who studied physics together (boy, does he love the subject being a physics graduate himself) but decided to pursue two different paths.
Marek is a physicist living in Warsaw, while Jan married and moved to the countryside, pursuing quaint science-related hobbies.
“Has it ever occurred to you that catching your breath may be the right way to live?”
The entire film is a conversation between them as Marek belatedly visits Jan, with Jan’s wife becoming a ‘third wheel’, occasionally annoyed by Marek’s presence but also pleased that his arrival has sparked some life out of her rather mutedly content husband.
As the two men chat about their personal and professional lives, Zanussi almost always draws us back to that elusive existential question: why lead a life of seeming nothingness, with little ambition, as Marek appears to accuse Jan of? Conversely, why live a life chasing something and always being perpetually out of breath?
Although the philosophical tension regarding the right way to live feels palpably intimate, Zanussi doesn’t make any judgment. Like a mathematical equilibrium, Jan and Marek are two opposing forces that also need each other for validation.
Beautifully shot in black-and-white, including extreme wide shots of the snow-covered Polish landscape as well as trademark hard ‘inserts’ of books and artefacts (a technique that would reach some kind of apotheosis in 1973’s Illumination), The Structure of Crystal is still regarded as an essential part of Zanussi’s body of work.
Grade: B+
Eternality Tan 