I'd never heard of this Polish director until a Polish colleague lent me three of his films on DVD for the weekend - War of the World - Next Century (1981), O-Bi, O-Ba - The End of Civilisation (1985) and Ga-Ga - Glory to the Heroes (1986).
The sparse comments on the IMDB suggest that they're at least intriguing, and I've never seen Polish dystopian sci-fi before.
Have any of you seen any of his films? And are they any good?
(The DVDs are all Polish Region 0 PAL, with English subtitles - I haven't watched any of them yet)
Piotr Szulkin
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Galen Young
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MichaelB
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Thanks for that - that looks very useful.
I watched War of the Worlds - Next Century (Wojna Å›wiatów - nastÄ™pne stulecie, 1981) last night, and rather enjoyed it.
Some of it has dated horribly (notably the cheesy synth score that was clearly intended to sound cutting-edge and futuristic - it's set in late 1999) but other aspects are eerily prophetic - notably the virtual enslavement of the population via the medium of "reality TV" (it's actually called that, if the logo's anything to go by). It's also fascinating seeing a Polish film made in 1981 - presumably a few months before the Jaruzelski crackdown - depicting the workings of a repressive police state quite so explicitly.
In fact, it had a surprising amount in common with Andrzej Żuławski's The Third Part of the Night, which I coincidentally watched a few days ago - in both films, social status seems to be linked to one's willingness to devote one's blood to the aid of dubious political causes linked to an occupying oppressor.
I particularly liked the sly dedication at the start to H.G.Wells and Orson Welles - which made it clear that absolutely nothing should be taken at face value. I won't post any spoilers, but a seemingly vital part of the story turns out to be a colossal red herring.
Full marks to the DVD - the source print was virtually blemish-free (bar a handful of obtrusive reel-change marks) and the transfer itself was anamorphic, looked correctly framed at 1.85:1, and the colours rang true. The subtitles clearly weren't written by a native English speaker, but they were never seriously distracting - or at least no more than the numerous English-language signs that appear onscreen. As with many other foreign films set in a supposedly Anglophone environment - Marcel Carné's London-set Drôle de drame being a particular favourite - the tone is slightly off in a way that may or may not have been intentional.
This page on the film is in Polish, but has some good stills (or screengrabs).
I watched War of the Worlds - Next Century (Wojna Å›wiatów - nastÄ™pne stulecie, 1981) last night, and rather enjoyed it.
Some of it has dated horribly (notably the cheesy synth score that was clearly intended to sound cutting-edge and futuristic - it's set in late 1999) but other aspects are eerily prophetic - notably the virtual enslavement of the population via the medium of "reality TV" (it's actually called that, if the logo's anything to go by). It's also fascinating seeing a Polish film made in 1981 - presumably a few months before the Jaruzelski crackdown - depicting the workings of a repressive police state quite so explicitly.
In fact, it had a surprising amount in common with Andrzej Żuławski's The Third Part of the Night, which I coincidentally watched a few days ago - in both films, social status seems to be linked to one's willingness to devote one's blood to the aid of dubious political causes linked to an occupying oppressor.
I particularly liked the sly dedication at the start to H.G.Wells and Orson Welles - which made it clear that absolutely nothing should be taken at face value. I won't post any spoilers, but a seemingly vital part of the story turns out to be a colossal red herring.
Full marks to the DVD - the source print was virtually blemish-free (bar a handful of obtrusive reel-change marks) and the transfer itself was anamorphic, looked correctly framed at 1.85:1, and the colours rang true. The subtitles clearly weren't written by a native English speaker, but they were never seriously distracting - or at least no more than the numerous English-language signs that appear onscreen. As with many other foreign films set in a supposedly Anglophone environment - Marcel Carné's London-set Drôle de drame being a particular favourite - the tone is slightly off in a way that may or may not have been intentional.
This page on the film is in Polish, but has some good stills (or screengrabs).