Artur Zmijewski Movies
As directed by Jacek Filipiak, the action-infused Polish thriller Crown Witness dramatizes the meeting of two men, each of whom harbors a deep-seated and potentially explosive agenda. One, a reporter, must guard a potentially incriminating secret from his past, while his subject, a reformed Mafioso, prepares to put his life on the line by testifying against his mob associates. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pawel Malaszynski, Robert Wieckiewicz, (more)
Celebrated Polish filmmaker Andrzej Wajda takes the helm for this Oscar-nominated drama detailing the harrowing events surrounding the 1940 massacre of captured Polish army officers in the Katyn Forest. A unique blend of conventional narrative and documentary-style filmmaking, Katyn opens in the spring of 1940, just as the Soviet Secret police execute a group of Polish officers. On September 1, 1939, Germen forces had descended upon Poland, paving the way for the Red Army to occupy east Poland as part of the Hitler-Stalin pact. As the Red Army assumed control of east Poland, all officers in the Polish army were placed in Soviet custody. Determined to remain loyal to the army despite the growing danger, Polish officer Andrzej refuses to flee with his wife, Anna. It isn't long before invading forces begin arresting professors in Cracow, and as the detainees languish in prison camps, their families start to fear that they'll never see their loved ones again. Flash forward to April 1943, and the Germans announce the discovery of mass graves. While Anna is relieved not to hear her husband's name on the list of bodies discovered, countless others are left to grieve their losses with no explanation or consolation. January 18, 1945: Cracow is liberated by the Red Army, and propagandist newsreels from the Soviet Union blame German forces for the massacre at Katyn. It is at that point that the fine line between collaboration and resistance within the People's Republic of Poland becomes exceptionally blurred. As the details surrounding the massacre gradually begin to emerge, Wajda reveals precisely how this horrifying massacre unfolded by flashing back to the spring of 1940 for an extended sequence in which Polish officer internees are transported by railroad to Smolensk and methodically dispatched before being casually buried in a mass grave. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Maja Ostaszewska, Artur Zmijewski, (more)
- 2006
Award-winning Polish director Marek Koterski takes an unflinching look at the pathological effects of severe alcoholism on familial relationships in the no-holds-barred drama We're All Christs (Wszyscy jestes'my Chrystusami). The story concerns Adas (played at ages 33 and 55 by Andrzej Chyra, and Marek Kondrat, respectively), a father caught in the web of alcohol addiction passed down from the generations before him. The disease once threatened to destroy his own relationship with his young son. Now, after admitting his own problem and experiencing therapy and rehabilitation, Adas takes the first steps toward a challenging reconnection with his family and attempts to rebuild long-decimated bonds. As a lapsed Roman Catholic, he begins to turn toward the faith that he shunned as a youth, and recognizes the necessity of turning away from the evil, abusive legacy of his father on earth and toward his Heavenly Father as a far-superior alternative. In the end, his Catholicization will partially entail turning to Christ as a role model by assuming responsibility for his own earthly burdens (and thus, taking up his cross). ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Marek Kondrat, Michal Koterski, (more)
- 2005
The 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment marked one of the most influential and hotly-debated behavioral science trials of the late 20th Century. During the said year, Stanford University psychologist-cum-professor Philip Zimbardo and several colleagues assembled a mock jail in the basement of one of the campus buildings, and hired some 24 undergraduate students to play the roles of both guards and inmates. The students adapted to their roles with extreme and terrifying results; those given guard status began to indulge in sadistic, tyrannical behavior, while those assigned prisoner status felt imposed-upon, dominated, and cruelly mistreated, and suffered from longstanding psychological issues as a result. The documentary Repetition witnesses not the original experiment, but a 2005 reworking of it in Warsaw, Poland, in which a Polish actor, Artur Zmijewski, attempted to recreate the 1971 endeavor note-for-note in a Polish sociocultural context. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- 2002
Based on the book by Stanislaw Rembek, Wyrok na Franciszka Klosa (The Condemnation of Franciszek Klos) was made for Polish TV by director Andrzej Wajda. During WWII, Klos (Miroslaw Baka) works as a policemen who helps the occupying Nazi soldiers in his village. Against the better judgment of his wife (Grazyna Blecka-Kolska) and his mother (Maja Komorowska), Klos degrades himself for the Nazis after he gets condemned to death for war crimes. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Miroslaw Baka, Maja Komorowska, (more)
Set near the end of the Bosnian conflict, director Wladyslaw Pasikowski's high-octane war drama follows the journey of a respected military man who risks it all in order to rescue a brigade of trapped soldiers. As the fighting draws to a close, Major Kellner (Boguslaw Linda) leads a peacekeeping force into Bosnia. Accused of defying orders for his role in rescuing a Polish mercenary from a lynching, Major Keller is already under investigation when he ignores orders and attempts to rescue a group of Polish soldiers on the front. In hopes of finding out what makes the legendary military man tick, Major Kellner's ambitious replacement tags along for the ride. Polish action icons Zbigniew Zamachowski and Olaf Lubaszenko co-star. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Boguslaw Linda, Tadeusz Huk, (more)
- 1998
In this Polish-German fantasy thriller, Wroclaw lawyer Anna Bracka (Antonina Choroszy) is after top-level corruption when her lover Jerzy (Artur Zmijewski) suggests she take a bribe to lose the case. After her angry refusal, he rapes her, and she drives away into the rain, nearly hitting amnesiac Witek (Mariusz Bonaszewski) wandering in the road. She takes him to an abandoned housing project, and when his memory returns, he tells her his gun was once owned by retired military prosecutor Jan Szymanski (Jan Nowicki), Anna's father. Anna goes to her father, who remembers prosecuting and then befriending Witek during the 1949 communist takeover of Poland. Flashbacks link the idealistic young Witek, who refused to sign a false statement and betray his beliefs, to the equally idealistic Anna. The young Szymanski is portrayed by Lukasz Nowicki, son of Jan Nowicki. Winner of the Indie Filmmakers Award at the 1997 Houston Film Festival. Shown at the 1998 Berlin Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Antonina Choroszy, Mariusz Bonaszewski, (more)
- 1997
The incredible repression and paranoia of Stalin's regime in Russia was reflected elsewhere in the Iron Curtain countries of the 1950s. In this thrilling story, set in Hungary and based on screenwriter Geza Boszormenyi's own experiences, a young man is sent to a prison camp for the crime of accidentally engaging in conversation with a fugitive. Once he arrives at the camp, he is put to work doing heavy manual labor and is given a starvation diet, just like the other prisoners. He joins seven men who are determined to escape, is the only one who succeeds in doing so, and is also the only one of the seven to survive. He has memorized the names of hundreds of his fellow prisoners, and once he escapes to the West, reads them aloud over the air on Radio Free Europe. In this way, his father learns that he is still alive. The story is directed by the screenwriter's wife, Livia Gyarmathy. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Artur Zmijewski, Krzysztof Kolberger, (more)
- 1994
In this crime drama, a ring of Polish criminals are implicated in the murder of a Chi-town cop and the disappearance of a few Russian immigrants. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Thomas Ian Griffith, Rutger Hauer, (more)
One question that arose when Poland changed from its communist form of government to a more open model was what to do with its thousands of secret policemen. Clearly, some of them couldn't be integrated into the regular police force, and some of them could. In this police thriller, Olo (Marek Kondrat) is a former secret policeman who has joined an illegal drug cartel, and he soon comes into conflict with one of the men newly integrated into the regular police force. Despite his being a "regular" policeman, Franz (Boguslaw Linda) refuses to play by the book, and uses many of his old techniques and contacts to track down whoever is killing so many of his new colleagues. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Boguslaw Linda, Cezary Pazura, (more)
- 1989
Director Tadeus Konwicki adapted his screenplay for Lawa from the famous Adam Mickewicz poem Dziady In slow, symbolic fashion, the film recounts the loss of Polish independence. Gustav Holoubez plays the Mickewicz counterpart, while Maja Komorawska essays the dual role of the Pilgrim and the Wizard. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Maja Komorowska, Gustaw Holoubek, (more)
- 1989
Tomek (Arthur Zmijewski) is one of those rare people who follow their best instincts and get away with it. In this story, Tomek has made the acquaintance of Julia (Krystyna Janda), a very depressed, neurotic older woman. He invites her to stay with his devoutly Catholic mother (Maja Komorowska) and himself, and the two of them then try to deal with her hysteria and neediness. When it becomes clear that she needs treatment for her condition, Tomek goes to West Germany and, refusing the easy money his father (who is living there) offers him, takes a job in order to make enough money. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Krystyna Janda, Artur Zmijewski, (more)
