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COMPILED AND EDITED BY KONRAD GOODOZINS KI!
Poland is without doubt the most exciting single film production country in the world today. As such it fs far ahead of any Eastern country, and in concentration and relative number of good films produced it is also ahead of most Westérn countries. It must be born in mind that
Poland produced only about 20 films a year since its great fitm renaissance began in 1954, and when one considers that among these 200 films there are at least 30 which have a high artistic caliber and a solid, eoherent form, the extent of the Polish effort becomes obvious. No other film production country in the world today can claim 15% excellence.
The reasons for the creative upsurge of the Polish cinema are varied; one of the prime ones is undoubtedly the “revolution” of Gomulka, which considerably freed directors, writers and actors talk as freely as any equivaelent person in the West, and often more candidly. The Polish spirit is one of the joys of a journey to East Europe —a matchless humor and a dauntless siubborness make them the Irish of the East. With the added trait of creativity thrown in for good measure.
Poland’s film industry is divided intp eight “‘production urits,” each fairly independent, and each supervised by a creative director. Thus the ‘KADR” unit, perhaps the most famous of all, is supervised by Jerry Kawalerowicz, today Poland’s dean of film directors, and includes among the directors who work within its system people like Andrzej Wajda, who made the “Generation’’-“Kanal”= “Ashes and the Diamond” trilogy.
Within each unit the directors are free to suggest their own themes, or writers their own stories. If a theme is accepted, there is no overall ideological control.
The basic problems are the same, however. Polish films, especially the best ones, also deal largely with war themes, and principally for the same reasons. Not until 1961 did the Poles make at least 50% of their films on contemporary subjects, and one must sadly say that the contemporary films which they did make in 1961 do not come up to the quality of the previous war films, or even the war films made in 1961.
The Polish films are varied, and one cannot do them iaatae in a short space. Generally speaking their common characteristics are an intense individuality which engages the spectator deeply; a fiery formal attack which leads to an extreme pictorial beauty; a self-delivery to their subjects by the directors, which causes emotional repercussions in the attentive spectator; and a sparseness of treatment which allows for the intelligence: of the viewer. The Polish films are mature films par excellence, which cannot help but appeal to a mature audience.
VARIETY