Discoveries from Poland World Cinema

The documentary depicts the process of making the film adaptation of Jerzy Pilch's novel, 'Under a Strong Angel'.

The cultural legacy of Polish cabaret pioneer Bohdan Smoleń comes alive in this intimate documentary exploring his professional highs and personal lows.

A film featuring Bolek and Lolek about traffic regulations.

A film miniature set to music by Robert Schumann. Various faces of women taken from paintings by Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Botticelli, Titian, and Ingres show women as muses, ladies, heroines, and lovers. The clash of perspectives on women by artists from different eras and the depiction of women in many incarnations constitute a cinematic attempt to define the essence of femininity—an eternal theme explored by painters of all ages. The film culminates in Mona Lisa's mysterious smile, which is the director's commentary on the constant attempts to capture the ephemeral, the indefinable, and the elusive.

World War II. Kulak of Polish descent has been robbed. A man is so desperate that he decides to go through a minefield to pick apples for his dying son.

The titular magic lantern is simple projection apparatus, invented several hundred years ago. In the animation, it appears as an object symbolizing the power of eyes and behind the scenes crimes.

During the autumn of 1989 the director visited the territory of the USSR in search of the places where Polish citizens sent to labor camps had been executed. His route was marked out by diaries of former prisoners and the deportation chronology.

In the Russian town of Głupów, there is a strange governor who has a music box in his head. When the music box breaks down, anarchy reigns in the town.

The runaway shows up in a forest hut in the Bieszczady Mountains, taking advantage of the host's hospitality. After dark, three hunting party dignitaries join them.

The film was made at the Polish Sculpture Center in Oransko, during sculpture workshops for deaf-blind people. The camera shows the process of creation, which is closely connected with getting to know oneself. It is accompanied by hesitation, anger and joy.

The other side of the picture hides a parallel world. At the same time and place, the same story happens. Two worlds are constantly intertwining and interacting with each other.

Basia is five years old and lives in the city with her parents, her brother and a stuffed friend. Sometimes, like any child her age, she faces big problems and does so with intelligence, curiosity and a particular sense of humor.

The final stages of alcohol addiction are juxtaposed with the official attitude of Polish authorities towards the success of the ever-growing national alcohol industry.

Animation short by Robert Turlo.

The box from the film strip becomes an arbitrary plot of action relating to the mysterious phenomena taking place in the Bermuda Triangle. Experimental short by Jerzy Kalina.

A film about the international community of people fascinated with World War II, who fulfill their ambitions in computer games. They take the role of pilots of flying machines during WWII and participate in air battles in real time. Some of them treat it as a hobby, but for many of them the game has become their life. Has a new human species been born - Homo Virtualis?

Yyaa shows film's capacity to manipulate the represented reality through montage. The artist filmed himself screaming "Yyaa!" in the same room, but lit in various ways. Then, he edited these takes into a single scream - impossibly long and impossible in reality.

In the 1960s, the famous Icelandic film director Thrandur Thoroddsen, "a friend of all Poles visiting the island", as Tomasz Walat described him in his article, took up studies at the Łódź Film School.

The film addresses the passage of time by making a comparison between rivers and the main character's life.

A story about a possessive relationship between a mother and her daughter. The daughter, through unexpressed anger and rebellion against her mother, transforms into a goldfish. Her repressed childhood emotions are manifested in her harshness towards herself and others.

An ironic pastiche of the typical instructional-education film.

A popular science film depicting a microcosmos in a droplet of water.

A creative documentary showing the absurdity of Polish reality in the 1970s. The dramatic axis is the story of a man who, in the middle of the Polish People's Republic, decided to start a mushroom cultivation and processing plant—a profitable business, and therefore, from the point of view of the decision-makers of the time, suspicious and dangerous.

The film presents a juxtaposition of the author's photographs of Memling's triptych "The Last Judgment." It poses the problem of choosing good and evil. Images of atomic explosions, the rubble of a burned-out city and the mocking laughter of the devil.

Directors Katarzyna Iskra and Justyna Pelc encourage several characters to surrender themselves to the hands of a therapist offering non-erotic touch sessions. The soothing effect of this unusual procedure also affects us, reminding us that cinema has the potential to be not only a space for reflection but also relaxation.

A portrait of Waleria Mirecka, a teacher and social activist, known and respected by all the inhabitants of Racławice. She was awarded the Mother of the Village order. The woman also found both private and professional fulfillment in Racławice.

Ania's candidacy for the role in the school play is rejected. The girl experiences failure painfully.

Sokor, struggling with an addiction to alcohol, tries to defend a man accused of murdering a hairdresser.

Animated adaptation of Adam Mickiewicz's ballad entitled Mrs. Twardowska, made on the hundredth anniversary of the poet's death (1855). Jan Marcin Szancer, an outstanding graphic designer and book illustrator, was the author of the script and the art concept. He was a person present in the Polish film industry since the interwar years. The main animator of Mrs. Twardowska was Witold Giersz, the future master of animation. The fluidity of movement and the grace of the characters, similar to the ones in The Goat Kid, evoke associations with Disney films. This beautiful film proves the creative possibilities and ambitious attitude of the Polish animation community a few years after the war.

The film is set in Osiedle Piastowskie in Zielona Góra. A group of friends from the yard finds a way to provincial stagnation in amateur filmmaking. Their latest picture is on the threshold of going beyond the concrete block. Unexpectedly, a boy from the neighborhood appears with new ideas. In addition to colorful laser techno events, happy evenings in a local pub and entertainment friends, it offers drug experiments.

There's no April 31 and May the 1st is a Labour Day - the most important communist holiday. A gritty morning in the city of Lodz seen through the eyes of a worker who spends it with his colleagues drinking and talking about shady businesses. He's proud of his proletarian roots, but the reality is rather bitter than sweet for him. However, he seems to be happy living in his simple world of dreams, TV programs and drinking cheap wine. The viewer is left with a dissonance between the backyard and the facade, bwetween "normal" existence and the ideology and content of TV programs.

The action takes place in a fictional country. One day the head of the Ministry of Public Morality is Susan, whose greatest misfortune is to have a twin sister. Twin sister is actress and cabaret revue, which performance and behavior discredits the minister.

A mysterious forest somewhere in the Łódź region has for generations inspired fear and curiosity among the inhabitants of nearby villages. They recount the stories they told or heard about ghosts and phenomena that defy rational explanation.

Mela, a 15-year-old skater, feels lonely and lost, searching for her place in the world. She believes in the teachings of a controversial relationship guru – if you are not sexually active, you are a loser. In her search for closeness she meets 25-year-old Michał, who impresses her with his self-confidence. Their relationship becomes more complicated when Mela tries to seduce him. To accept herself she needs to confront her past and her biggest authority.

Basia dreams of having a dog. So much so that nothing else interests her. Well, except maybe jellybeans. Even a vacation seems pretty awful if you can’t have a dog. However, Basia’s family decides to go to the sea under a tent. Will it be the best or worst vacation in the world? And maybe Basia will manage to meet some dog…

Radek, an aspiring and ambitious life-coach, pushes for a promotion. Unfortunately, when he looses his self confidence in a bar fight, he resorts to mind-hacking, which gives unexpected results...

The classic fairy tale about a miserly fox who served a stork his dinner on a flat plate and the stork who returned the favor by serving his dinner in a narrow jug.

Intended as a documentation of Polish artist and theatre-maker Tadeusz Kantor’s “informal painting”, Mieczysław Waśkowski’s film develops a hectic experimental life of its own. The gestural application of paint is staged on changing spatial levels by means of glass plates, camera movements and lighting, making not the painter but the abstract form-finding the movie star.

The adventures of a classic "podrywacz" character known from Molière's drama and Byron's poem, who has not lost popularity until today. All this is shown with a pinch of salt, in a grotesque form of a cut-out film, reminiscent of the comic book editions of "Trzy Muszkieterów".

A contemporary take on the Last Supper of Jesus and the Twelve Apostles with an unexpected twist. A drama based around a group of men seated at a table, moving to the rhythm of modern music for a string quartet.

Documentary about the making of the 1983 film "Danton" by director Andrzej Wajda.

A purge in the style of those of March 1968 is to take place at a party meeting. Instead, it turns into a psychodrama.

The 1941 Jedwabne pogrom was a long-standing blank spot in Polish history. It was not until Jan Tomasz Gross's book "Neighbors" that a debate on Polish-Jewish relations during the occupation began. The film shows how this topic divided Poles and was appropriated by historical politics.

In 1987, colour slides were found in a second hand book store in Vienna which turned out to be a collections of photographs taken in the Lodz ghetto by the Nazis' chief accountant. Walter Genewein boosted productivity in the ghetto while keeping costs down, a policy which led to the Lodz ghetto surviving much longer than any other in Poland. He recorded what he considered to be the subhuman aspect of the Jewish workers and he was concerned only with the technical quality of his photos. Director Dariusz Jabłoński's prize-winning film uses the photographs in a different way. He recreates for us the suffering of inmates, giving a compassionate picture of that it was like to be trapped in the ghetto. (Storyville)

Article 66 of the 1952 Polish Constitution guaranteed women equal rights, including work, equal pay, and childcare. Notable women held various roles, and the state supported women before and after childbirth with nurseries and kindergartens. The film, made in the socialist realist style, praised the socialist system and showed historical optimism but also highlighted the burden of balancing work and unpaid housework. Notably, the film was created by women.

Etude realized as part of the costume and characterization workshop under the artistic supervision of Ewa Braun.