Alicja Jachiewicz Movies

Director Andrzej Zulawski's adaptation of Manuela Gretkowska's controversial screenplay reaches new extremes in the depiction of brutality, explicit sex, and passion as it tells the story of an anthropology professor Michal's (Boguslaw Linda) growing obsession with a mummified shaman; spirituality; and the enigmatic, sexually voracious, violently disturbed beauty known only as "The Italian" (Iwona Petry). Along with very explicit erotic scenes, the film contains Zulawski's usual deliberate assaults on conventional morality, Catholicism, and Polish censorship -- any of which may offend certain viewers. ~ Yuri German, Rovi

The bleak life of a disengaged and slightly dotty older woman is examined in some detail in this film. Zofia (Ryszarda Hanin) lives in a retirement home and seldom relates to anyone, except when her daughter is visiting. Then, even though her interactions don't really make much sense, she at least perks up. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

A young man becomes a hero when he successfully leads a village brigade against the Germans. The departure of the Germans leads to new challenges, for Poland is divided against itself: one group wishes to remain non-communist, another is actively pro-communist. The young man, though he supports the communist side, is basically uncommitted and dies during the ensuing conflict. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

This highly influential award-winning film, set during the time of the Nazi occupation of Poland, is rich with multilayered apocalyptic imagery and symbolism. Even though the film won an award for best debut in Poland, distribution was halted there by the authorities, and the director was viewed with suspicion. His next film, Diabel was kept from release for 12 years, until 1988. The film begins as a young man narrowly escapes the massacre in which his family is annihilated. He makes his way into town where he is nearly captured, but another man wearing clothes similar to his own is taken in his stead. After taking refuge in the home of a pregnant young woman who closely resembles his dead wife, he helps her with the birth of her child. While working in a typhus center, as someone who is repeatedly infected with the disease in order to produce vaccines for others, he experiences many hallucinations and does some bizarre things while seeking to come to grips with his traumatic life and the guilt he feels for being alive when all who knew him are dead. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi