Gabriela Kownacka Movies

A young street tough attempts to make good for his violent transgressions in writer/director Marek Stacharski's gritty urban drama. Stan is a 20-year-old mechanic who has recently become mixed up with a vicious street gang. His mother is usually drunk, and his younger sister grates on his every nerve. In order to get out of the house, Stan prowls the street with his friends looking for trouble. The gang isn't above a little robbery, and one night they even go so far as to gang rape a young woman. Later, Stan is forced to flee from the scene of a crime and injures his leg. Upon arriving at the hospital for treatment, the limping hoodlum recognizes the nurse as the woman he and his friends raped. And the nurse recognizes Stan too, yet remains hesitant to report him to the police after the doctor she is sleeping with discourages her from doing so. As the weight of guilt gradually begins to settle on Stan's chest, he takes a sincere interest in the young nurse and tries to make amends for his actions. Meanwhile, however, the troubled girl begins making preparations to follow her father to America. When Stan attempts to cut his ties to the gang, he quickly discovers that escaping one's past can be a painful, and sometimes deadly, endeavor. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

The futility of war was one of Polish director Andrzej Wajda's major themes, and he explored it from nearly every perspective imaginable, using storytelling styles which range from the strictly commercial to those focusing more on symbolic imagery. As this film opens it is 1939, and war seems to be only a distant possibility to a group of vacationing young Polish Lithuanians who are seen greeting their Lithuanian Catholic and Jewish neighbors respectfully. In particular, Witek, a young man hoping to pass his final exams so as to begin university study, is having a bit of a lark, attempting to woo a lovely fellow student, and braving a shotgun blast from her protective father. He and his fellows are full of foolhardy and pompous talk about war and death. Meanwhile, Polish troops are mobilizing to fight the Germans, and the impending storm of war overshadows everything. One of the most idyllic scenes of young love ever committed to film (in the opinion of one reviewer) graces this film, and the story closes just as the war is beginning in earnest. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

In this uneven drama set during World War I, reality and fantasy mix and mingle in the fevered brain of a prisoner sick with typhus. Rafal (Wojciech Wysocki) is a journalist specializing in satire, and the war years find him locked up in prison with two unusual cellmates, one is a safecracker and the other a killer. The three men are locked up together until their different crimes have been thoroughly investigated -- which means they may be together for awhile. Rafal starts to sketch out a novel based on his experiences in prison, and after typhoid fever hits him, his mind can no longer distinguish between the characters in his novel and those in reality. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

This drama by Jerzy Trojan concerns Janek (Jan Englert), an artist, who has parked himself on a street corner at a busy intersection in the city. He is supposed to meet his girlfriend there, but time goes by and then goes by some more, and she does not show up. While he occupies the passing day with vivid fantasies as to what will happen to her when she finally does come, flashbacks also show how he has treated her in the past. This lamentable past and imperfect future reveal just what kind of a person Janek really is. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide