Zbigniew Zapasiewicz Movies

The title of this film -- taken from graffiti on a wall near director Krzysztof Zanussi's home -- provides ironic commentary on its subject, which revolves around a doctor's questioning of his beliefs when he is confronted with terminal illness. Tomasz (Zbigniew Zapasiewicz) is first seen working as the doctor on the set of a French movie production about the life of Saint Bernard. After his work is finished, he returns to Warsaw, where he makes the unpleasant discovery that he has cancer. Tomasz' only hope is an expensive operation in Paris, and he is forced to ask his ex-wife Anna (Krystyna Janda) -- now remarried to a self-important yuppie -- for money. Anna writes him a check, but when he goes to Paris for the operation, Tomasz is informed that his condition has become inoperable. Facing imminent death, he begins to question the beliefs he has held all his life and, with a sense of fatalistic liberation, starts to experiment with both his own life and those of others. A great success in Poland, Zycie Jako Smiertelna Choroba Przenoszona Droga Plciowa won the Best Picture award at the 2000 Moscow Film Festival. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide

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

Laura is a woman of many parts: she is a wife, a daughter, a mother, a rock musician, a mistress, and a hospital personnel administrator. As a wife, she is none too happy, as she is locked into a union with an unenterprising and unfaithful man who is the son of a national hero. She has a brief affair with a younger man who seemingly has time to follow her around from place to place, and she is considering reviving her career in a defunct rock band, at the behest of its leader, an old friend. However, the most absorbing part of her life is her work at the hospital, where she discovers evidence of great and small injustices perpetrated by the heavy hand of the state. In one especially moving moment, she travels with a doctor she is trying to persuade to retire, as he revisits the site of the now-vanished buildings where he was held prisoner for many years without ever being charged or tried for any crimes. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

This disturbing and violent feature opens with a scene of a dead rat and a lifeless cat hanging by the neck. As the plot unfolds, Yatzek (Miroslaw Baka) is a 20-year-old drifter who murders a testy taxi driver (Jan Tesarz) in a gut-wrenching scene of excessive violence. Tension continues to build as a newly licensed young attorney (Krzysztof Globisz is chosen to represent Yatzek in court. Much anticipated and well-received at Cannes, the film won the European Film Academy Award for "Best European Film" in 1988. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

This drama has an actor trying to escape from his high-profile position. The film appears in Polish, with English subtitles. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide

In a dramatized rendering of drug problems in Poland, director Andrzej Trzos-Rastawiecki opens his uneven docudrama with the death of a young teenage girl -- she has just overdosed on a lethal second injection administered by her boyfriend Jacek (Rafal Wieczynski). She got Jacek hooked in the first place, and in his grief and guilt, he goes to a rehabilitation clinic to request admission. A panel of his peers has to decide on his request because he was admitted once already and failed to stay drug-free. These strict rules may seem logical, but Jacek's subsequent behavior implies they are less than compassionate. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

The Polish Year of the Quiet Sun is set in the years following World War II. In a small Polish town, a United Nations war-crimes investigation is taking place. While the courtroom battle rages on, American soldier Scott Wilson takes advantage of a few precious r-and-r opportunities. He falls in love with Maja Komorowska, a war widow. Despite obvious political and ideological differences, the romance flourishes--at least until it's time for the Americans to pack up and leave. More cerebral than carnal, Year of the Quiet Sun was originally release in Poland as Rok Spokojnego Slonca. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Polish filmmaker Krzysztof Kieslowski's Blind Chance was originally titled Przypadek. Boguslaw Linda plays a middle-aged man at a crossroads of his life; whatever choice he makes for his future has the potential of ending in disaster. A sudden accident forces Linda to choose immediately. In keeping with the transcendental nature of his best work, director Kieslowski contrives to permit Linda to sample each of three possible "futures" from three different points of view. Like many of Kieslowski's films, Blind Chance was officially banned when completed in 1982 (the plot was set in motion by the government clampdowns of 1981) and not permitted a public showing until 1987. The film is also known as The Accident. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In 1905 a partitioned Poland was striving for independence from the Russians, Germans, and Austrians, and terrorist, guerrilla squads conducted selective assassinations to further the nationalist cause. A young man in one of these groups, hardly a killer by instinct or inclination, murders a Russian spy and is brought to police headquarters for questioning. When he is suddenly released after a session with a duplicitous judge, he goes back to his underground organization to report on the judge's conduct. Instead of acting on his information, the group sends him out to kill a Polish writer who they say has sold out to the Russians. The young man tracks the writer all the way to Italy, after observing his court trial in Cracow and being pretty much convinced that the writer was innocent of the charges brought against him. When faced with the moment of truth when he must kill the writer, he cannot do it. Once again, he has to return to his organization and bring them information that they will not want to hear. This time, however, his disobedience to their orders weighs heavily against him. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Jerzy Michalowski is a journalist who has been licensed by the Polish State to travel abroad. He researches stories and at the same time represents the country in journalistic circles. When, on a foreign broadcast, he displays a much too-thorough knowledge of the actual state of affairs inside Poland, the authorities decide to punish him by inexorably withdrawing his privileges one by one, without any explanation. Each reduction in privileges brings this once-proud man's estate lower, and the intervals between them are great enough for him to think that his punishment has reached it's culmination...until the next. This unusual and politically significant Polish film follows director Andrzej Wajda's Men of Marble in indicting abuses of power by the state, and was made shortly before the military took control of the government. Wajda says "I worked on this film in a blind rage..." ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide