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REMINDER!
ESCAPE FROM THE 'LIBERTY' CINEMA - TONIGHT 6:30pm at Barbican - followed director Wojciech Marczewski in conversation with Michael Brooke.

Thanks to all who were able to make it to Barbican on Tuesday for Marczewski's Escape from the 'Liberty' Cinema. The film looked terrific - and afterwards there was a very entertaining Q&A with Marczewski and Michael Brooke.

Still a few tickets available for Krysztof Zanussi's ILLUMINATION this Friday 15th at 6.30 + Zanussi himself will also be in attendance.

Bikey wrote:Thanks to all who were able to make it to Barbican on Tuesday for Marczewski's Escape from the 'Liberty' Cinema. The film looked terrific - and afterwards there was a very entertaining Q&A with Marczewski and Michael Brooke.

The pleasure was all mine - Marczewski was an absolute joy to interview. I only wish it could have gone on longer!

Full details of this release now up at our website

Michael Pattison reviews at idFilm

It's slightly weird reading the protagonist of Escape from the 'Liberty' Cinema referred to as 'Cenzor' as though that was his name - he's called that in the end credits, but it literally means "the censor".

In the booklet essay, I called him Rabkiewicz, based on the credits listing in the Film Polski database - he's never actually referred to by that name in the film itself, but he does at one point mention that his daughter's name is Marta Rabkiewicz, which is pretty clinching as she doesn't appear to be married.

Our POLISH CINEMA CLASSICS VOLUME II BOX SET is out today.

Nice words from Steve Morrissey in the Evening Standard:

"Restored films from titans of Polish film-making - Andrzej Wajda’s industrial-revolution epic The Promised Land (1974), Krzysztof Zanussi’s introspective Illumination (1972) and Wojciech Marczewski’s surreal satire Escape from the “Liberty” Cinema (1990), made just as communism was collapsing. An unmissable box set."

The Arts Shelf (which also has the individual cover art for the three films).

Cine Vue:

A truly inspiring set of films, this will make an excellent addition to the shelf of any true cinema fan. These are three definite classics from Polish masters and each will leave you speechless for entirely different reasons. Whether it be the moral depravity of 19th century Lodz, a heart-wrenching polemic on censorship, or a confounding examination of humanity, they're all very much worth checking out if you get the chance.

The Quietus on Kinoteka, which includes detailed appraisals of The Promised Land and Illumination.

Philip French reviews "this excellent box set" in today's The Observer

"These are films you probably won’t have seen before – and they are wonderful."
Colin Dibben at Close-Up Film

Wow, The Promised Land is a truly beautiful film (and transfer). Second Run has really outdone themselves with this choice of film. I'm not typically a Wadja fan, but the two films they've chosen so far to represent him are leagues above anything else I've encountered. The movie is nothing like any other Polish film I've seen with the poetic metaphor that seems to drive the filmmaking beyond the threadbones of the story. All of the shots are just so beautifully crafted like the one of the burning building with the light pouring out suggesting there's nothing beyond what we see. I can't wait to dig into the rest of the set.

Thanks knives for those kind words. It's great that people are reacting so strongly and positively to these films. We still find it unfathomable that THE PROMISED LAND especially had never been released in the UK before!

Well just a little thank you for having the smarts and luck to be the introducer.

Just received the box yesterday ! What a bundle ! Excellence all the way through - from the quality of all the transfers, brilliant essays to the informative extras (finally know why TPL didn't get the Oscar in 75). Obviously do not have to mention that all three titles are ten-out-of-ten (ok, The Promised Land is 11/10) absolute classics of polish cinema and thanks to the mighty Second Run finally they got the treatment they deserve. Along with "Third part of the night", "Confidence", "Marketa Lazarova", "The Cremator", and "PCC volI" this little box of chocolates belongs to my fave SR's releases.

As regards Andrzej Wajda, still there are so many gems waiting to be discovered by the audiences outside Poland, "Hunting Flies"!!!!(69), "Without Anesthesia"(78) , "Everything for sale"(69)... to name a few. Polish Cinema Classics Vol III, anyone? :>

Wow. Those are kind words and praise indeed. We're really delighted that everyone is responding so strongly to this set and the three features.

More Wajda coming up later this year... can't say more just yet - but we did just announce Kawalerowicz's NIGHT TRAIN from the Polish Cinema Classics Volume 1 as a stand-alone release on May 27th.

The Digital Fix.

Krzysztof Zanussi in conversation with Peter Hames at the Kinoteka 11th Polish Film Festival.

Mondo Digital:

Don't let the simple, unassuming graphic design on the cover fool you; these are wildly inventive, visually startling, and often outright surreal films with a number of gasp-inducing visual surprises.

MichaelB wrote:Mondo Digital:

Don't let the simple, unassuming graphic design on the cover fool you; these are wildly inventive, visually startling, and often outright surreal films with a number of gasp-inducing visual surprises.

I know exactly what scene in The Promised Land he's thinking of.

The fire? There's a few other shocking shots, but that's the one to knock it out of the ballpark for me.

Ah, no. For me the couldn't-believe-what-I'm-seeing moment was when

Spoiler

the poor background character was converted into a geyser of blood before our eyes. So gruesome, grisly and off-handed that it summed up the horror of industrialization far more efficiently than any diatribe could. And I think 'surreal' as applied to the extreme, jarring violence of that moment is a good use of a worn-out adjective.

That scene came to mind, but it doesn't ring as 'surreal' so I put it back in the pocket. It is a stand out moment of the what just happened variety though. I desperately needed to think to realize what just had happened.