Helen's blog

Yikes, can it already be 30 years since Lech Walesa successfully led the Polish freedom movement, Solidarnosc, against the repressive Communist Regime and paved the way to liberty in the other Central and Eastern European satellite countries*

This year’s edition of the KINOPOLSKA festival paid tribute the 30th anniversary of the historic Solidarity movement.       

Although most young people now in their early thirties, like young French people, don’t remember those times of constant terror, censorship and privations, the sensation of living in an absurd reality was a feeling Polish youngsters, as well as Czechs and Russians lived with from a very early age. This anxiety, along with bouts of extreme despair are the themes presented in the programme of the festival, through a coherent selection of films from the era.

Most of the features presented were made during the political thaw of the 1980s, which corresponds to the rising of the Solidarity movement. However, a great number of those films were kept under the seal of censorship for several years.

Now, 30 years, after, the Polish Institute in Paris wanted to organize a series of encounters, inaugurating the event with ALL THAT I LOVE, by Jacek Borcuch, the first Polish feature film selected in the official section at Sundance Festival and more importantly, the Polish candidate for the 2011 Oscars.

 Poland 1981: Behind the iron curtain, Janek, the teenage son of a navy captain, forms ATIL (All That I Love), a punk-rock band whose songs, rehearsed in a converted bus and played at school proms, express a frustration with socialism and a desire for freedom, echoing the sentiments of the rising Solidarity movement. At the same time, Janek finds love with Basia, a young woman whose father is part of the movement and disapproves of Janek’s military family. When growing social turmoil leads to martial law, Janek’s relationships and ATIL’s music cause serious consequences for his family members, lovers, and friends. Jacek Borcuch refreshes the coming-of-age film and its familiar tropes—teenage rebellion, first love, and sexual exploration—by setting it within a sobering sociohistorical context. His camera captures a conflicting sense of potential change and stifling paranoia, with freedom just out of sight for his protagonists. All That I Love is a bracing, potent reminder that the personal can’t be easily separated from the political.     

The film has secured distribution in France by KMBO, headed by Marc Guidoni, of Fondovina FILMS based in Lyons, France, present at the opening night ceremony on November 23rd, at the Cinema Arlequin, in the Quartier Latin in Paris, who instantly fell in love with the film when viewing it at a festival in Europe. Remembering the Solidarnosc period himself, he was interested in a young director´s interpretation of that period.

Also attending was the film´s Producer, Dr. Renata CZARNOWSKA, as seen above lower right in the photo above, with the pink scarf. 

Among additional prominent Polish cinematographers who came to Paris for the festival, one of which, no doubt is the most outstanding multi award winning  film director JANUSZ ZAORSKI, director of MOTHER OF KINGS, the story of a widow bringing up her four sons alone in the totalitarian Polish communist state. Lucja tries the impossible to survive and keep honest. This exceptional film has won over fifteen prestigious international awards because of its realistic and true portrayal of one of the darkest periods of recent history of Poland - the Second World War and the Stalin regime. Shot secretly, in difficult conditions during the dictatorship, the film has only able to be seen in Polish cinemas since 1987.

Polish cinema personalities attending Solidarnosc Festival in Paris

Mr. ZAORSKI, appearing in the last two photos in the collage at left, an affable and visionary creator, is now working on his new film, a project in MONGOLIA, under freezing, minus zero weather.

 Concerning the other films presented at the Kinopolska Film Festival, with the exception of Kieślowski's "Przypadek" / "Blind Chance" and "Miś" / "Teddy Bear" directed by Stanisław Bareja, the films display women in roles that are more vulnerable, but in many ways braver than those of men. Those images reflect the old myth of the prototypical "Polish Mother" ("Matka Polka"), a woman that resists and survives through all possible catastrophes orchestrated by men fighting for the cause.

Programme of the 2010 KINOPOLSKA festival:

November 24: Women In History and facing the Power:

• "The Mother of the Kings" / "Matka Królów", directed by Janusz Zaorski, 1982, 127min (released in 1987 in Poland) at 18:00
• "Reverse" / "Rewers", directed by Borys Lankosz, 2009, 96min, at 20:30 (screening followed by a meeting with the director)

November 25: Animation, Children at Risk - 30 years of Polish animation – a selection presented by the International Animation Festival in Annecy at 18:00

• "Tango", directed by Zbigniew Rybczyński (1980, 8min)
• "The Plowman" / "Oracz" by Marian Cholerek (1982, 7min)
• "The Race" / "Wyścig" by Marek Serafinski (1989, 6min)
• "Franz Kafka" by Piotr Dumała (1991, 16min)
• "Ichthys" by Marek Skrobecki (2005, 16min)
• "Chick" by Michal Socha (2008, 5min)
• "Esterhazy" by Isabela Plucińska (2009, 25min, Poland, Germany)
• "Piggies" / "Świnki" directed by Robert Gliński, 2009, 93min at 20:30 (screening followed by a meeting with the main actor, Filip Gabacz)

November 26: Executioners and Victims, a Troubled Relationship.

• "The Lonely Woman" / "Kobieta Samotna", directed by Agnieszka Holland, 1981, 92min (television film released 6 years after its production, in 1987) at 18:00
• "Mother Theresa of Cats" ("Matka Teresa od kotow", directed by Pawel Sala, 2010, 94min, at 20:30 (screening followed by a meeting with the director)

November 27: Music Against Tanks

• "Beats of freedom" / "Zew wolności"* directed by Wojciech Slota, Leszek Gnoinski, 2010, 73min, at 18:00
• "All that I love" / "Wszysko co kocham", directed by Jacek Borcuch, 2009, 91min, at 20:30 (screening followed by meeting with the director)

November 28: On the Path to Liberty

• "Peter and the Wolf" / "Piotruś i wilk", directed by Suzie Templeton, 2006, 32min, Poland, Great Britain, at 16:00
• "Teddy Bear" / "Miś", directed by Stanisław Bareja, 1980, 111min, at 18:00
• " My Flesh, My Blood" / "Moja krew", directedby Marcin Wrona, 2009, 92min, at 20:30

November 29: The Master and the Debutants

A selection of first short films by up and coming directors, in association with the Cinéssonne European Film Festival in Essonne, the Era Nowe Horyzonty festival and the Andrzej Munk Foundation in Warsaw, at 18:00

• "Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark Room" / "Ciemnego pokoju nie trzeba sie bac", directed by Kuba Czekaj, 2009, 35min, fiction
• "Hanoi-Warszawa", directed by Katarzyna Klimkiewicz, 2009, 30min, fiction
• "A Mother" / "Matka", directed by Jakub Piątek, 2009, 11min, documentary
• "Wanted Woman" / "Kobieta poszukiwana", directed by Michał Marczak, 2009, 16min, documentary

A forum hosted by Elise Domenach from the magazine "Positif", with guest Marcel Łoziński, one o the most prominent documentary makers in Poland, in dialogue with young, up and coming directors, at 20:30, with the screenings of:

• "Microphone Rehearsal" / "Próba mikrofonu", directed by Marcel Lozinski,1980, 19min
• "Poste Restante", directed by Marcel Lozinski, 2008, 14min
• "MC. Man of vinyl" / "MC. Czlowiek z winylu", directed by Bartosz Warwas, 2010, 21min
• "Rabbitt à la Berlin" / "Krolik po berlinsku", directed by Bartek Konopka, 2009, 51min

November 30: Random or Destined?

• "Blind Chance" / "Przypadek", directed by Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1981, 112min (the film was released in Poland in 1987) at 18 :00
• "Zero", directed by Pawel Borowski, 2009, 110min (screening followed by meeting with the director)

The festival ran between November 24 - 30, 2010 at Cinéma Le Reflet Médicis, 3, rue Champollion, 75005 Paris.
Source: www.institutpolonais.fr

Photo collages by ALAIN ROBERT, Paris

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