Polish Movies that are worthwhile watching?

I was just wondering, could anybody give me a list of Polish films that are worthwhile watching? So far I have been only able to watch two: Knife in the Water and Man of Marble. Any suggestions? A list would be appreciated - thanks!

PS: would also be nice to state whether they are subtitled in either English, German or Dutch - I don't dig synchronized movies...

M-G

I've only seen a couple of Polish films so far, the best one called
A Short Film About Killing by legendary director Krzysztof Kieslowski,
which although it's pretty grim subject matter, its actually quite gripping.

HMV in the UK usually have a few in world cinema section or I've just
discovered polishmoviesonline.com who I'm going to try out,
just to practice the language more than anything else.


*It was subtitled in English

Thanks, amacfx! I will have a look at the list - indeed, I saw "a short film..." quite some time ago - great movie! Any more suggestions are welcome, thanks again!

M-G

did this for someone else yesterday and it has disappeared....but here goes again.

The movie "Katyn" is out on dvd the 21st february.

just ordered my copy from Merlin.pl comes with english subtitles.

Cost was 44.99zl pluss postage to england 22zl thought it was resonable...

there's been a thread not so long ago with a similar question, browse the subforum for more recommendations :)

Quite a few movies were discussed here:

http://www.polishforums.com/polish_movies_subtitles_polish-38_10859_0. html

and also in a more recent thread:
http://www.polishforums.com/must_see_movies_polish-38_18357_0.html

Hi all,

Can anyone tell me the name of the movie where the old lady starts screaming... "LUDZIE!"

I'm just dying to know :)

I've seen RH+ lately... quite good, actually.

some more information would be helpful :)

Dzień Świra!! 2 b, kurwa, or not 2 be

Killer and Killerów Dwóch
Zróbmy sobie wnuka

Demony Wojny - with Bogusław Linda

Umm, well I think the movie starts off with some injured guy walking into a town and collapsing. Then this old lady starts screaming "ludzie" to call the people from the town to come help him. That's all I can remember from the movie, my memory is kind of bad.

Definitely "Dzien Swira" and "Chlopaki nie placza"

Other films by:

Kieslowski (Decalogue - see what Ebert says about it, Double Life of Veronique,
Three Colours and Kielsowski's earlier stuff and docus).
Kielsowski's screenplay - The Day of the Camel - I think its only in Polish though,
directed by Jerzy Sztuhr.

Wajda - pretty much anything but especially his older stuff - Landscape after the Battle, and other older works. His newest stuff is not as good. His pretty much like Kurosawa I think, great in the beginning but burned out a little now and became too commercialised.

Roman Polanski - The Pianist but also older stuff too. Definately worth seeing.

Other directors:
Krysztof Zanussi
Wojciech Has - Saragossa Manuscript and The Hourglass Sanatorium (Amazon.fr has this one in French and Polish - I acquired it recently :) ).

Studios: the legendary TOR studio :).

Sadly most modern Polish cinema is not watchable. They try to copy Hollywood too much, while they have some talented actors and directors the screenplays are usually poor and plots completely unbelievable. Avoid!

Dzien Swira - Day of the Whacko was pretty good however it has some racist undertones (Black, Asian). However I wouldn't compare it with the stuff above.

You can buy most DVDs from a Polish store like Astabe.com (it mentions which DVDs have English tracks) or from labels such as Criterion Collection, Artificial Eye or
Tartan Video. Kieslowski, Polanski and Wajda are in the Criterion Collection.

You can find Polish films at:
Astabe.com Ebay.pl (more exp than Astabe) and Merlin.pl
US based DVD retailers eg Amazon.com or DVDpacific.com
some European retailers like Amazon.fr/de/uk
and other rare movie sites like Superhappyfun.com or Sazuma.com

Old films are great. "Poszukiwany, Poszukiwana" and "Seksmisja" (don't mind the title, the film is not rude at all) are the ones I can think of now that were actually fun to watch. :) I recomend them. I don't know if they are subtitled in English though.