The author discusses Scenariusze filmowe [Film Screenplays] by Jerzy Stefan Stawiński and I began to work in films by chance, being a record of an interview with him conducted by Barbara Giza. Both books are a kind of tribute to Stawiński, regarded first of all as a scenarist of Polish Film School. The first of them makes it possible to realize that his work was much more extensive. Both books have managed to present Stawiński in a way that he himself would like to be presented to the reader: as a man working for films, but being above all a writer. They show an image of a man who is satisfied (in readers’ and audience’s opinions), but at the same time dissatisfied (above all in his own view). A man who had an interesting life and who was able to talk about it in an exciting way, among others, through his works.
Film activity in the PRL (Polish People’s Republic) was subject to the Ministry of Culture and Arts and the Culture Department of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party. The latter one was a typical bureaucratic-party institution. It also means that it produced dozens of letters, reports, circulars, notes, etc. The name of Andrzej Wajda appears in them very often. No other artist was the object of such a grand interest, although of course Wajda was in the focus of attention of the Culture Department not only as a director, but above all as the president of the Polish Filmmakers Association and as the authority among filmmakers. Perhaps it is these voices from the “other side” that best inform how important he was in the 80’s among Polish artists. They also allow us to take a closer look at the tensions in this group. We can realize the party-bureaucratic dimension of film life in Poland and the way of functioning of one of the power centers responsible for cinematography.
The article presents two dimensions of the relationship between cinema and Polish independence. The first part was devoted to the situation of Polish cinema after 1918. I describe the film market, the political situation, relationship between the state and cinematography, films that were then created and their impact on national identity. Then I focus on films in which independence has become a movie theme. I divide them into three periods: until 1939, the People's Republic of Poland and after 1989. I draw attention to their political and historical contexts, functions and film form, and I discuss the meaning and interpretation of each films.
Polish cinema of the 1960s presented a specific vision of Warsaw, different from earlier and later ones, although it contained some solid motifs for the entire PRL era. These include emphasizing the uniqueness of Warsaw, the war past as an inseparable part of the city’s identity (though in the 1960s with a slightly different meaning) or the problem of getting a flat. The separateness and specificity of the then created images of the capital was related to the political specificity of the decade, the cultural and social moment of Warsaw development, the domination of realism that made the message authentic and genological issues – the main role in creating the image of the city was played by comedy. These images, however, were sometimes surprisingly subversive, breaking the dominant image.
Zwierzchowski Piotr, Kino, czytelnik i czytający. O Geniuszu Michaela Grandage’a [The Cinema and Two Types of Readers. About Michael Grandage’s Genius]. „Przestrzenie Teorii” 32. Poznań 2019, Adam Mickiewicz University Press, pp. 371–381. ISSN 1644-6763. DOI 10.14746/pt.2019.32.20. In Genius (2016) by Michael Grandage books are present in many ways. The main characters are William ‘Max’ Perkins, an editor of the Charles Scribner’s Sons publishing house and Thomas Wolfe, a writer starting out at the time. The film is concerned with their relationship and the creation of the novel. The book functions as both a work and an artefact (also as typescript). Literature is a conversation topic and a way of living. One of the most important spaces is the publishing house building. Piotr Zwierzchowski, however, analyses Genius primarily as a contribution to reflections on the act of reading and its film visualization, referring to the distinction introduced by Alberto Manguel(modelled on Barthes’ écrivain and écrivant) between the reader as someone who reads “with no ulterior motive” and one “for whom the text is a vehicle towards another function".
PL
Zwierzchowski Piotr, Kino, czytelnik i czytający. O Geniuszu Michaela Grandage’a [The Cinema and Two Types of Readers. About Michael Grandage’s Genius]. „Przestrzenie Teorii” 32. Poznań 2019, Adam Mickiewicz University Press, pp. 371–381. ISSN 1644-6763. DOI 10.14746/pt.2019.32.20. In Genius (2016) by Michael Grandage books are present in many ways. The main characters are William ‘Max’ Perkins, an editor of the Charles Scribner’s Sons publishing house and Thomas Wolfe, a writer starting out at the time. The film is concerned with their relationship and the creation of the novel. The book functions as both a work and an artefact (also as typescript). Literature is a conversation topic and a way of living. One of the most important spaces is the publishing house building. Piotr Zwierzchowski, however, analyses Genius primarily as a contribution to reflections on the act of reading and its film visualization, referring to the distinction introduced by Alberto Manguel(modelled on Barthes’ écrivain and écrivant) between the reader as someone who reads “with no ulterior motive” and one “for whom the text is a vehicle towards another function”.
The article examines how nudity was used as a promotional strategy in the Polish cinema in the 1980s. In contrast to earlier decades, the Polish movie industry delivered dozens of films that contained female nudity and erotic scenes. Some actresses like Maria Probosz, became automatically associated with such movies. Paradoxically, the Polish cinema of the 1980s was only slightly concerned with the discourse of eroticism. As Maria Kornatowska writes,The shortage of erotic sensibility was compensated by ‘bald nakedness.’’ The reasons for the increased presence of nudity on movie screens stemmed from the transformation of social lifestyle and audiences’ demand, the search for easy profit and the need to de-politicize society. Of significant importance were the influences of the growing video market and western cinema. Projections of nudity were meant to divert attention from the bleak reality of Poland enmeshed in crisis provide a sense of belonging to the Western world, and give mostly male viewers visual pleasure. It was also a marketing technique luring viewers to cinemas by bombarding them with daring posters and stills reproduced in the press and in front of movie theaters. My article will discuss and explain the ways of presenting female nudity in terms of these economic and political tasks.
The People of Nowa Huta. Two films by Kazimierz Karabasz Nowa Huta, a symbol of a generation and significant place in the symbolic space of the Polish People’s Republic, was a character in newsreels, documentaries and films many times. The latter include two films by Kazimierz Karabasz: Shadow is Not Far (1984) and Memory (1985). In them Nowa Huta forms a setting for stories told about common people, yet it is also an important setting that determines their place in life, both in the past and in the present, regardless of whether they feel attached to it or rebel against it. Karabasz s heroes were people from Nowa Huta. They built it, and worked and lived in it. They were also shaped by its building. They are therefore also the people of Nowa Huta.
Probably no other Polish filmmaker has devoted as much attention to the Polish United Workers’ Party (PZPR) as Krzysztof Kieślowski did in his films. Early on, he perceived the party as an organization where one could meet people with different desires, motivations and modus operandi. Kieślowski’s perspective could be defined as such: do not judge the whole, focus on individuals. His subsequent films present a change in this perspective. Workers and devoted members of the communist party were in the center of the director’s interest in some of his early films. Later, he focused more and more on individuals, especially those who had to face the party as a structure and hierarchy. Kieślowski’s films made in the early 1980s show party leaders and people in charge who eventually turn out to be losers. Kieślowski perceived various aspects and forms of being a party member, not only as a stepping stone for one’s career. He saw and presented the everyday life of PZPR, relations between the authorities and society, and its members and representatives of the party apparatus. He was quite critical about the party and people in charge, but also tried to see and present the reasons motivating their conduct. Social and political changes in Poland in the early 1980s made this kind of approach increasingly difficult for Kieślowski.
The film representations of the Polish United Workers’ Party are most often inserted in the dichotomous world of values, with explicitly assigned assessments. This article is concerned with the films reflecting in a more complex way on the Party members’ fates, perceiving individual biographies, being open to various interpretations of the past and able to separate the assessment of the system and the activities of particular persons. When analyzing the film images of Lechosław Goździk, Leonard Borkowicz, and Tonia Lechtman: Metryka Goździka (Goździk’s certificate, 2002) by Joanna Tryniszewska-Obłoj and Joanna Pieciukiewicz, Tonia i jej dzieci (Tonia and her children, 2011) by Marcel Łoziński, and Bezsenność (Insomnia, 2012) by Andrzej Titkow, as well as 45–89 (1990) by Łoziński, I tried to reconstruct both the image of the heroes they contain and the form of filmic expression. The authors answer the questions about events and attitudes, but they do not strive for the precision of academic history. They take into account historical and political circumstances, however, they concentrate on individual experience and memory. The films rehabilitate neither the communist system nor the Polish United Workers’ Party. Yet, they allow us to see the examples of their internal complexity as well as some ways to talk about them.
PL
Filmowe reprezentacje PZPR są najczęściej wpisane w dychotomiczny świat wartości, z jednoznacznie przypisanymi ocenami. W niniejszym artykule skupiam się na filmach zawierających bardziej skomplikowane rozważania na temat losów członków partii, dostrzegających jednostkowe biografie, otwartych na różne interpretacje przeszłości, potrafiących rozgraniczyć ocenę systemu i działań poszczególnych osób. Analizując filmowe portrety Lechosława Goździka, Leonarda Borkowicza i Toni Lechtman: Metrykę Goździka (2002) Joanny Tryniszewskiej-Obłoj i Joanny Pieciukiewicz, Tonię i jej dzieci (2011) Marcela Łozińskiego i Bezsenność (2012) Andrzeja Titkowa, jak również 45–89 (1990) Łozińskiego, staram się zrekonstruować zarówno zawarty w nich obraz bohaterów, jak i formę filmowej wypowiedzi. Twórcy odpowiadają na pytania o wydarzenia i postawy, nie dążą wszakże do precyzji akademickiej historii. Biorą pod uwagę okoliczności historyczne i polityczne, koncentrują się jednak na indywidualnym doświadczeniu i pamięci. Filmy te nie stanowią rehabilitacji systemu komunistycznego ani Polskiej Zjednoczonej Partii Robotniczej, pozwalają jednak dostrzec przykłady ich wewnętrznej złożoności, jak również pewne sposoby opowiadania o nich.
In this text I compare several films from the 1960s and the turn of the first and second decade of the 21st century: How to Be Loved (1962) by Wojciech Jerzy Has and Joanna (2010) by Feliks Falk, Echo (1964) by Stanisław Różewicz and “Mole” (2010) by Rafael Lewandowski and To the Speakeasy, (1965) Różewicz and Manhunt (2012) by Marcin Krzyształowicz. These films divide as much as it connects, but the similarities seem quite significant. Their theme is not war or lustration, but people put in an unusual situation, their choices, attitudes, dilemmas, but also love. None of them war is a source of pride or glory. I see in them the same problems, attitudes, discourse of values, ideological and dramaturgical solutions, but also the separateness of the dominant images of memory, past and war. This allows me to ask about the status of the relationship between the old and the new Polish cinema, focus on some constant sense or sense of repetition. All these films combine non-obviousness, lack of faith in unambiguous answers, and break stereotypes in Polish thinking about the past, memory and war. Return to the same topics, ways of recognition, doubt, axiological order does not mean a simple continuation of and references to the classics of Polish cinema. New films are rather evidence that successive filmmakers are looking for answers to universal questions. They do not allow culture to close in ready-made schemes.
PL
W niniejszym tekście porównuję kilka filmów z lat 60. oraz przełomu pierwszej i drugiej dekady XXI wieku: Jak być kochaną (1962) Wojciecha Jerzego Hasa i Joannę (2010) Feliksa Falka, Echa (1964) Stanisława Różewicza i Kreta (2010) Rafaela Lewandowskiego oraz Na melinę (1965) Różewicza i Obławę (2012) Marcina Krzyształowicza. Filmy te równie wiele dzieli, jak łączy. Niemniej jednak podobieństwa wydają się zbyt istotne, by przejść obok nich obojętnie. Nie tyle wojna czy lustracja są ich tematem, ile ludzie postawieni w niecodziennej sytuacji, ich wybory, postawy, dylematy, ale i miłości. W każdym razie w żadnym z nich wojna nie jest powodem do dumy czy chwały, niezależnie od tego, czy kończy się zwycięstwem, czy staje się przyczyną heroicznych zmagań i cierpień. Mimo upływu lat i różnych kontekstów dostrzegam w nich te same problemy, postawy, dyskurs wartości, rozwiązania ideowe i dramaturgiczne, ale też odrębność wobec dominujących wizerunków pamięci, przeszłości i wojny. Dzięki temu mogę zadać pytanie o status relacji między dawnym i nowym polskim kinem, skupić się na sensie pewnych prawidłowości bądź znaczeniu powtórzeń. Wszystkie te filmy łączy nieoczywistość, brak wiary w jednoznaczne odpowiedzi, używając pewnego uogólnienia - przełamanie stereotypów funkcjonujących w polskim myśleniu o przeszłości, pamięci i wojnie. Powrót do tych samych tematów, sposobów ujęcia, wątpliwości, porządku aksjologicznego nie oznacza prostej kontynuacji czy nawiązań, mających podkreślić odwołanie do klasyki polskiego kina. Nowe filmy stanowią raczej dowód na to, że kolejni twórcy poszukują odpowiedzi na uniwersalne pytania. Nie pozwalają kulturze zamknąć się w gotowych schematach.
This article is devoted to Polish comedies made in 1960s and dealing with the Second World War. The films analysed are: Stanislaw Lenartowicz’s Giuseppe in Warsaw, Tadeusz Chmielewski’s Where is the General? and How I caused the Second World War, and Bronislaw Brok’s Cafe “Under a lamprey”. The presented films posed questions and presented situations that were not that different from those described by the Polish Film School, however they provided completely different answers, thus becoming a part of the cinema of new memory. Visions of the world, the war and the Polish role in it presented in those films fitted in well with the political and ideological context of the time, and the societal expectations. The comedies avoided controversies, and referred to the stereotypes and auto-stereotypes accepted within the society, and applied conventions of the genre, in particular – farce. Their present day popularity proves that they represent values that go beyond the cultural politics of the decade.
Filmy Macieja Adamka: "Konkurs" (2002), "Życie przed Tobą" (2003), "Jestem" (2004) oraz "Gry i zabawy dziecięce" (2010) są bardzo wnikliwymi portretami dziecka i dzieciństwa nakręconymi bez poczucia dominacji dorosłego, angażującymi emocjonalnie, a jednocześnie stanowiącymi znakomity punkt wyjścia do refleksji nad społecznym światem dziecka. Adamek zmusza widza do skonfrontowania się z kulturowymi wyobrażeniami dzieciństwa jako okresu szczęścia i beztroski. W filmach tych znajdziemy też refleksję na temat przemian społecznych ideologii w odniesieniu do dziecka i jego potrzeb rozwojowych oraz konsumenckich, jak również potwierdzenie tezy, że dzieciństwo jest zjawiskiem społecznie konstruowanym.
EN
Films by Maciej Adamek such as: 'The Competition' (2002), 'Life to Live' (2003), 'I Am Here' (2004) and 'Kids Play' (2010) are very insightful portraits of children and childhood, made without a feel ing of an adult’s domination over the film. They are emotionally engaging, and at the same time, they offer an excellent starting point for reflection on the social world of children. Adamek forces the viewer to confront the cultural concept of childhood as a period full of happiness and innocence. In these films there is also a reflection on the social changes of ideologies related to children, their development and consumer needs, and a confirmation of the thesis that childhood is a socially constructed phenomenon.
Artykuł składa się z dwóch części: próby diagnozy aktualnego stanu badań nad kinem PRL-u oraz części postulatywnej. Zdaniem autorów polska historiografia filmowa koncentruje się głównie na zagadnieniach estetycznych (dominacja opisu twórczości reżyserów filmów fabularnych uznanych za artystów i autorów). Odwołując się do metodologicznych założeń nowego historycyzmu oraz Nowej Historii Kina, autorzy wyrażają zaniepokojenie ahistoryzmem historiografii kina PRL-u. Postulują w związku z tym m.in.: hasło „powrotu do źródeł”, głównie archiwalnych; częstsze niż dotychczas powściąganie ambicji interpretacyjnych na rzecz solidnej pracy filmograficznej pozwalającej opisać losy konkretnych projektów filmowych w ich uzależnieniu od kontekstu ekonomicznego, społecznego i politycznego; badanie tzw. kultury produkcji kina polskiego; badanie paratekstów filmowych (fotosy, plakaty, zwiastuny, reklamy filmowe itp.) i marginalizowanych zjawisk (takich jak kino oświatowe czy „polska szkoła dubbingu”); badanie recepcji (zarówno widowni, jak i piśmiennictwa filmowego).
EN
The article consists of two parts: a diagnosis of the current state of research on the cinema of the socialist period, and a postulate. According to the authors Polish film historiography focuses mainly on the aesthetic aspect (the description of the work of film directors recognised as authors and artists dominates). Referring to the methodological assumptions of the new historicism and New Cinema History, the authors express concern caused by a lack of historism in the historiography of cinema of the socialist era. They therefore suggest “a return to the source”, that is the archives; a certain restrain in one’s interpretative ambitions, thorough research allowing the description of specific film projects in relation to their economic, social and political context; research on the culture of production in Polish cinema; research of film para-texts (stills, posters, trailers, movie advertising, etc.) and marginalised phenomena (such as educational cinema or “Polish school of dubbing”) and research on film reception (both audience and written film reviews).
JavaScript is turned off in your web browser. Turn it on to take full advantage of this site, then refresh the page.