Zulawski’s unfinished sci-fi epic, disrupted by the then Communist Polish government, about the perils of forming a new civilisation on an inhospitable planet is manic, ambitious if somewhat befuddling filmmaking at its best, rendered generously with jump cuts, astonishing imagery and the commitment to highly-physical performances.
Kieslowski’s most political film takes a look at activism, law and ghosts through two parallel but related stories, but it doesn’t quite achieve the transcendence of his later pictures.
Good but not great, this handsomely-mounted biopic about a Welsh journalist’s news-breaking report on the Ukrainian famine of the early ‘30s under Stalin is a welcome introduction to a murky and disturbing part of 20th-century history.
Love, forgiveness and redemption weigh heavily in this Oscar-nominated religious-based drama about a young sinner who unexpectedly poses as a priest in a small Polish town.
A disturbing and occasionally powerful look at youths with suicidal tendencies through the off/online realms that they inhabit.
This precise drama by one of Poland’s foremost female directors is wryly comic if also conceptually peculiar as it explores grief and the afterlife against a father-and-daughter narrative.
One of Polanski’s finest films, and a great WWII Holocaust drama about human resilience, and the beauty and power of music to overcome sheer adversity.
Continue reading →The story of a female football team as they prepare for competition season told in a straightforward manner – without turgid narratives about femininity or victory.
This black-and-white Polish Oscar winner is shot with a spare, understated elegance, but sometimes at the expense of narrative depth.
Continue reading →Well-crafted with dazzling black-and-white cinematography, and certainly a film to appreciate, but it is emotionally vacuous.
