After the cultural breakthrough of ]October 1956, Polish film quickly emerged as one of Europe’s freshest and most thrilling powers, many years before the new waves of Britain, France, the Czech Republic, and Hungary. More notably, the previous decade has seen a full-fledged resurgence of Polish filmmaking, culminating this year with the country’s first-ever Oscar for the best foreign language picture. The next time you entertain yourself with online games on https://www.bobcasino.com, take a break to get a cultural fix with these Polish films.
1. The Pianist
Directed by Roman Polanski
If you don’t recognize anything at all about Polish cinema, The Pianist from 2002 is a film you’ve probably heard of, if not seen. The film, directed by Roman Polaski, is based on Wladyslaw Szpilman’s memoirs titled ‘Death of a City’ and spans the years 1939–45, capturing his life in the Warsaw Ghetto, preventing deportation to extermination camps, and surviving through the Warsaw Uprising.
2. Loving Vincent
Directed by Dorota Kobiela and Hugh Welchman
Polish film is known for its expressive and aesthetic impact, and Loving Vincent takes the graphics to the next level. Loving Vincent is a Polish-UK co-production made by Dorota Kobiela and Hugh Welchman about the death of Dutch artist Vincent Van Gogh and the attempts of a postman’s son, Armand Roulin, to send Van Gogh’s farewell letter to his brother in Paris. The narrative is compelling on its own, but the uniqueness of the animation remains a major attraction—each of the film’s 65,000 frames was created by 125 artists that use the same oil painting on canvas techniques used by Van Gogh himself.
3. Ida
Directed by Paweł Pawlikowski
Ida, a stunning film shot entirely in black and white, became the first Polish film to win Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards. In 1960s Poland, Ida is a young lady ready to accept her oath to become a Catholic nun. She was orphaned as a youngster during WWII, but she is told that she has one living relative, an aunt, whom she must see. She discovers that her family was Jewish, and what ensues is an unsettling and somber road journey to find out what happened to their family, as well as an identity crisis for Ida. While the Holocaust and the German occupation of Poland are never explicitly acknowledged, they linger over the picture like a heavy fog.
4. Cold War
Directed by Paweł Pawlikowski
Following his Oscar breakthrough with Ida, Pawlikowski’s next film was 2018’s Cold War, a difficult love tale about a mismatched couple who meet in the ashes of post-war Poland. The film is set during the Cold War era, beginning in the 1950s, and depicts the ups and downs of the couple’s love, the twists of fate they experience, and the challenges that the time’s politics impose on their lives. This may be as frustrating to watch as the characters’ poisonous relationship; yet, it is vital to watch. Given the critical accolades his previous two films have garnered, it would be prudent to monitor Pawlikowski’s career in the future.
5. Day of the Whacko
Directed by Marek Koterski
In our humble view, the zenith of Polish humor was during the Communist era, albeit there have been a few gems created since then. Day of the Whacko tells the story of divorcee Ada Miauczyski, a dissatisfied Polish language instructor suffering from OCD. The movie depicts a regular day in Ada’s life as he battles as a writer and with his own impulses, daily routines, and everyone else around him—in other words, the Polish public, all of which irritate him to the point of mental fatigue. Despite not being intended as a comedy, the movie’s depiction of common Polish life and national qualities was an instant success in Poland. For those who are new to the nation, the video functions almost as a documentary on some of the oddest behaviors encountered and witnessed by expats in Poland.