AMSTERDAM

Watchable. The film is so weird, with such quirky events, staged dialogue and convoluted plot, I was watching only to find out whodunit. Disney loves its sepia-toned nostalgia. This movie's too stylish and fake to be amusing and Christian Bale is no comedian for certain. Margot Robbie, however skilled an actress she is, doesn't delight in brown hair cut short. Neither does Anna Taylor-Joy with her forced staged pronunciation. Atmos sound ensures clarity at least. 'The Great War', now known as WW1, is referred to as "the war to end all wars" - the quote comes from H. G. Wells but has been used recently by Marvel too. Towards the end, when other famous actors join the cast, the story turns political which is much more engaging. As the couple in love are to board the ship, a few smart and beautiful lines about standing up for truth are uttered but they get quickly forgotten at the finale letting you in on the characters' subsequent fates. Ah, there's lots of narrative by two protagonists too. What a bore. 

KINO DZIECI (KIDS KINO)

ZA DUZY NA BAJKI (TOO OLD FOR FAIRY TALES) - Q&A WITH THE THREE CHILD ACTORS, PRODUCER AND MUSIC COMPOSER 

The 3 child actors live far from each other but got on like a house on fire at once and became best friends forever on set. Actor Maciej Karaś (Waldek in the movie) likes gaming, hates cycling, some lines in the movie came from him. Both boys are similar to the characters they played. Both the actors and the director wanted them to be themselves, not caring about comments, so that it looks authentic. They played themselves. The producer didn't interfere, trusted everyone's skill. Director Kris (Kristoffer Rus) interfered in the music so that it doesn't take attention away from the protagonists. Both the composer and the director played to the contrary: if sad, to take this feeling away, to lighten up, if comedy, also to change the mood.  Music shouldn't disturb. E.g. in the fist bump scene where the last music 'boom' is on the fists. The 1.5 months' shooting took place from mid-August to the end of September so it took one month of school time, both boys were in the 8th grade. They never opened the textbooks they took with them. But Patryk (the slim boy, playing Staszek Lebioda) was reading "Quo Vadis" on set between scenes. As interviewer Kaja Klimek remarked, Jennifer Lawrence had been reading "Harry Potter" during "Hunger Games". As for the gaming scenes, the screen was blue and they pretended playing. Maciek was already thinking about lunch. Kids on acting with adults: "they taught us a lot, were mentors, gave tips." An adult actress had to adjust herself and become natural. The movie was shot in Warsaw, only the airport and wakepark outside the city but nearby. A professional stuntwoman jumped instead of the aunt and the cameraman jumped with her. The actress, Dorota Kolak, had a special cameraman with a small Go Pro camera. She had great character, the kids talked to her a lot. Patryk Siemek dubs and acted in 2 commercials, the girl (Amelia Fijałkowska as Delfna Rogalska) dubs, was in a commercial and an episode of the serial "Na dobre i na złe". Maciek acted only at a school Nativity play - as a donkey. The producer hopes for a sequel. A script is there, shooting scheduled for next summer, to be ready in March 2024. This first film was shot a year go - the girl was 11, the boys 13 back then.

ICARE (ICARUS)

Watchable. Partly saucy, partly mildly philosophical, loosely inspired by the myth. I couldn't quite make out the sense of the plot. But it looked lovely, Disneyesque. Arabic music and bellydance in ancient Greece? Historical data indicates both the rhythms and the dance may well be accurate.

ORPHAN: FIRST KILL

Recommended. It opens like a horror. But it's a gripping slasher with a top-notch twist of action in the middle. Isabelle Fuhrman, who co-produced the film, stands out in the ambiguous role, the final shot sees her eyes change. She's accompanied by a solid set of good actors. In the finale music can be heard from both sides. 

AFRYKAMERA 2022

JESTEM (I AM)

Recommended. A black and white short film about Afropoles - smart, with wonderful opening dancing. 

VUTA N'KUVUTE (TUG OF WAR)

Watchable. Just out of curiosity why it was selected to candidate for an Oscar as the 2023 Tanzanian representative. Shot in Swahili, it shows multilingual, multicultural Zanzibar in Soviet Union times. No idea what the message behind it is. What's worse, it all feels staged, talked directly to one camera - like in theatre, with a make-believe rescue in the plot and wooden acting. While the music varies in style and quality, most of it is just unbearable.

AFROSZORTY VOL. 1: AFROFUTURISTIC

Each of the 6 short films was preceded by maps clearly marking the country and its languages so you knew where the set was taking you next. 

QU'IMPORTE SI LES BETES MEURENT (SO WHAT IF THE GOATS DIE)

Watchable. A Moroccan short film dealing with the question of what if aliens existed. The clearest plot of the 6 films, simple, no special effects. A religious dilemma and a real one of what to do. Quite vague content though.

WE NEED PRAYERS: THIS ONE WENT TO MARKET

Watchable. The Kenyan short film is an artistic mockery of art lovers' sophistication and the simplicity of ideas with which artists attempt to make money. Beautiful costumes, make-up and hair-styling. Quite vague content though.

ETHEREALITY

Watchable. The Swiss/Rwandan short offering consists of musings on migration and what constitutes home where space travel is no different than refugeeism. Other than a "Major Tunde" wearing a spacesuit, it's a documentary on living abroad for decades. Quite vague content though.

HELLO RAIN

Watchable. The Nigerian short film is a riot of colour, a confection of costumes, make-up and hair styles in a sci-fi flick filled with special effects. Plot-wise, juju mixes with technology. Quite vague content though. Simple plot, stylish performance. Beautiful. With a post-credit. 

MULIKA

Watchable. In this short, an alien astronaut crashing in Goma is a ruse to present the Congolese stand on mineral excavation - people die for technology. Africans are the people of the Sun. Quite vague content again.

TWICE AS GOOD

Watchable. The British short flick deals with the perception of blacks in the UK: "When they see you half-capable, you need to be twice as good." Quite vague content. No idea what the science fiction part is to mean. 

KOLO FILOZOFII POSTKOLONIALNEJ ON AFROFUTURISM

The university club of postcolonial philosophy gave a talk on what afrofuturism actually is: Science fiction has never been exclusive, at first it used to be written under nicknames, also alienation was a common trope - that's a situation similar to African. Slaves were as if abducted by aliens. In history, Poles thought against slavery when they had contact with blacks so were then treated like blacks too. Water is a common trope. An ocean is connected to rituals, environmental matters, slave trade. Columbus had lived off slave trade before discovering America, once most of the people on his ship died drowning in the ocean. There are myths of drowned blacks who became mermen. But also some saved themselves from slavery finding a way through the ocean. Early afrofuturism was dominated by Afroamericans. Beyonce's album covers, Uhura in "Star Trek", "Black Panther", "Dirty Computer" album by Janelle Monáe music videos and film are examples of afrofuturistic expression and ideas. Afropunk Festival is known for its fashion. Fashion and art are ways to convey otherness. Transgender also features in the genre. 

DON'T WORRY DARLING

Recommended. Written by Katie Silberman and directed by Olivia Wilde. With Florence Pugh, Olivia Wilde, Chris Pine and Dita Von Teese. Much like "The Stepford Wives" but with contemporary technology and taking into account women's position nowadays. It re-invents the memorable science-fiction story.

WARSAW FILM FESTIVAL

The 2022 festival, organized by Warszawska Fundacja Filmowa, showed 88 full-length films, including 28 documentaries, and 68 short films. That's 156 movies in total from 56 countries. Many were world, international or European premieres. The short film competition qualifies films for the Oscars in 4 categories. Years ago WFF had taken place at Atlantic and Palladium so the last year was a return to Atlantic - rooms A, B, C, D and it took rooms 1, 2, 3, 4, meaning the lower level, of Multikino Złote Tarasy. "Я і Фелікс" ( "Rock. Paper. Grenade") was the only Ukrainian production in the main competition. Korean "뉴 노멀" ("New Normal") was made by a director who had previously specialised in horrors.

KING

Watchable. Awfully run-of-the-mill. The lion, behaving surprisingly more like a dog than a cat, and some wonderful French landscapes are the main attraction. While it's all convincingly acted and the girl (Lou Lambrecht) tells the hen story like a pro, and the level is considerably kids and teenagers', the villain character is sketchy - you don't know what he is and why he needs the little lion at al. The setbacks are like in all other 'girl-takes-care-of-a-lion-cub' flicks. The usual animal liberation message is loud and clear.  

BODIES BODIES BODIES

Walked out. A group of youngsters organize a party, some of them snort drugs, some talk rubbish, they play a dumb game. And not a single good-looking guy in sight in this would-be slasher.

WARSAW KOREAN FILM FESTIVAL

성형수 (BEAUTY WATER)

Recommended. A spine-tingling animated science fiction horror drama about how we perceive ourselves and are seen by others. Every aspect of being ugly or beautiful and of keeping your look is explored. 

유체이탈자 (SPIRITWALKER)

Watchable. Confusing from start to end. Engaging as you want to find out the protagonist and his mates' identity and how and what he stepped in. But the drug supposed to be hallucinogenic wouldn't make him move bodies for real. I couldn't make out the rest of the plot so have no idea if that makes sense or also not. Lots of action. No justification.

모가디슈 (ESCAPE FROM MOGADISHU)

Recommended. The 2022 Korean candidate for an Oscar was shot in Morocco. Music is African at first and gentle. The true events depicted in the movie are terrifying. Atmos-recorded warfare is chillingly powerful - you're in the middle of it. The film combines gripping action with a peace message. Occasional humour enhances the plot. African music returns at the end of the credits but in a violent form. 

WARSAW KOREAN FILM FESTIVAL

같은 속옷을 입는 두 여자 (THE APARTMENT WITH TWO WOMEN)

Watchable. A drama about psychological violence but also about the lack of understanding each other at work or with potential friends. A lot happens on the emotional level between the characters but, however engaging the story is, it's not always comprehensible and doesn't evoke feelings in the viewer. Something rings false. It's the superficiality of the two protagonists, the lack of deeper justification, the reactions of both women involved are unnatural at times and often over the top on the mother's part and too subdued in the daughter - though the latter may be explained somehow. Some shots are overlong, many on the disturbing side and inexplicable. The flute music surrounds you but is so awful and ear-drilling I covered my ears. Not an easy film and not for emotional reasons. Feels staged a lot. 

브로커 (BROKER)

Watchable. It opens with a shot of torrential rain in what resembles the lowest situated street inhabited by the con artists form "기생충" ("Parasite"). The protagonists are in a similar line of work and form a peculiar false family unit. Will 是枝裕和 (Hirokazu Koreeda) ever stop creating those oddball families? Well, unlike "万引き家族" ("Shoplifters"), this one at least doesn't drag. And 송강호 (Song Kang-Ho) adds irony in the comic bits, however infrequent they are. The police women are quite wooden, especially the older one, and that whole subplot feels fake. But the two young actors: 아이유 (IU) and 강동원 (Gang Dong-Won) are good-looking and the story not so obvious, as you get to know everyone's motivations piecemeal. Shot with great sympathy to the hapless criminals, engaging, it highlights how unfair adoption laws are. 

APOKAWIXA

Recommended. I didn't expect a good movie from Xawery Żuławski after "Mowa ptaków" ("Bird Talk"). But this one is pure fun with lots of Polish culture elements, historical weapons, social changes. There's little macabre, it's all tongue-in-cheek and a riot of colour and music. Too-cool-for-school youngsters party like there's no tomorrow. Chances are there isn't. Written at the very onset of the pandemic, it presents the world imagined back then, though the dead fish and climate change ring true nowadays. Konrad Eleryk, Mikołaj Kubacki, Waleria Gorobets, Alicja Wieniawa-Narkiewicz, Tomasz Kot, Michał Karmowski, Matylda Damięcka are superb in their roles.

KINO DZIECI (KIDS KINO)

About the best organized festival of the year. The organizers prepared extra attractions for children inside and outside cinemas. The 10 films from the main competition had English subtitles. The catalogue colour-coded the sections, divided the films by age groups, provided pictures and descriptons. The opening movie "LasseMajas Detektivbyrå – Skorpionens gåta" ("Jerrymaya's Detective Agency - The Riddle Of The Scorpion") had its world premiere. The child actors attended the event and also saw the film for the first time right there and then. 

GANDHI & CO.

Watchable. Pleasant Indian music. The story is naive but praises community values. Kids learn to be truthful, altruistic, honest and to strive in spite of setbacks.It's occasionally humorous, e.g. "Did you also see the devil dressed up as Gandhi?", with top-notch performances by children and adults alike. 

WARSAW KOREAN FILM FESTIVAL

특송 (SPECIAL DELIVERY)

Recommended. "Transporter" meets "Taxi" in this high-speed actioner. Starts with a great music theme, recurring later occasionally. A runaway from the North or corrupt police are common but tried and tested tropes. The plot is rich in detail. 박소담 (Park So-dam) in the lead role looks cool, fit and perfectly plausible. The ending indicates a sequel potential. With such amiable characters, I'm looking forward to it.

DC LEAGUE OF SUPER-PETS

Watchable. The beginning is excellent, all dog lovers will be delighted watching typical behaviours of Superman's pooch. But the film gets ruined by action: full of cliches, with superpowers which don't make sense. In Poland it's dubbed in Polish, in the original, Dwayne Johnson, Kate McKinnon, Keanu Reeves voice the characters. Creative language is used in the dialogues and captions, e.g.Big Belly Burger in the town backdrop. TV captions are shown too briefly to read them all, some dialogue is incomprehensible. There are a mid- and a post-credit - the latter is better.

SZCZESCIA CHODZA PARAMI

Watchable. I did laugh out loud a few times, e.g. at sex-suggesting poses or an error, but the whole plot is so secondary, it's much like American romantic comedies "Good Luck Chuck" and "Just My Luck" where a man confers good luck on women or a woman swaps her good fortune for bad respectively, with the difference here it's a man bringing bad luck to ladies. This one is in fact on the French licence for "La chance de ma vie" ("Second Chance") which I haven't seen. The same actors are cast as in all Polish movies - you feel bored as soon as you see the much too familiar faces. Music is often good but sometimes poor.

SIMONA

Watchable. A documentary tribute to a phenomenal environmentalist and animal lover, who actually graduated from animal psychology at the faculty of biology, Simona Kossak. It's a thorough biopic. The first half an hour is her family history, even interesting but could have been cut short. The same with the ending. The fascinating part is the one about animals: from funny stories like the controller who sat in an armchair thinking the owl on it's back was stuffed, through the mess in the house overrun by various creatures, to horrifying paw-smashing traps used by scientists in the past. Plenty of insight into people's appalling attitude to animals. That's marred and diluted by the family history but what ruins the film the most is music - truly hard to bear.

NOPE

Watchable. Genius Jordan Peele went awfully wrong this time. His movies get longer and longer. This one's overlong. 130 minutes that drag. Accidental cut, where Park's conversation with his wife is suddenly cut off for no reason and where the sequence of events often appears random. Worst of all, the monster looks like the billowing fabric it's made of. While the plot is original, a horror it is not. It's also poorly translated into Polish by Agata Deka

THE TWIN

Recommended. Opens with a start. Further the movie adheres to the full set of the golden rules of a supernatural horror. A cemetery is shown early on, there's an obligatory moving to a secluded house, old photographs, a devil (or incubus) figure, furniture covered with white sheets, a decoy in the form of a fake scare, a series of weird conversations, a nightmare, an odd memoir, a wish made, peculiar people in the village, an old woman warning, a local tradition - in Finland, not Sweden but the association with "Midsommar" is obvious, unrecognizable sounds, an astonishing child's drawing, a cult and then a long series of real spooks - it ticks all the horror boxes and therefore is predictable - at times I knew exactly what they were going to say. It's on the slow side. Still, it's scary as hell (pun intended). The predictability of the plot and even lines spoken only increase the tension. The finale turns the story around.

Reviewed from the distributor's screener, cinematic reception might differ.

JOHNNY

Watchable. Having glanced at a synopsis I thought I might walk out from it. Luckily the movie's engaging, even if a bit tacky, especially the pregnancy. Dawid Ogrodnik is superb as the mumbling priest, Trojan appears in his type of role. I was impressed by excellent cinematography by Michał Dąbal and directing by Daniel Jaroszek, nice video clip style fast forward sequences, but that Polish music (including Dawid Podsiadło, Luxtorpeda, Muniek Staszczyk - all famous among Poles) was awful, at times I was only waiting for a song to finish. The topic is typically Polish too: a terminally ill, a priest, a converted drug addict. It's the addict's own story, not the priest's. The family images in the restaurant in the final shots are authentic. Still, the film doesn't explain why he eventually had to serve his suspended sentence. There's also some inconsistency in how long he was to stay in prison - 3 years, while the priest had 0.5 years left to live. There are also too many endings. 

LE CHENE (HEART OF OAK)

Watchable again. You can look a fox in the eye or see a wood with the eyes of a predatory bird, hear an insect climbing up a tree, watch mice carrying their offspring in their mouth, rodents and birds cleaning themselves and each other. Cute and beautifully filmed. Soothing. Repetitive though.

DIANA. THE PRINCESS

Recommended. I was sobbing throughout this documentary about Princess Diana - it was so moving: from a fairy-tale wedding to her premature demise all through media footage - and there's been plenty. Like on no other royal. The resulting biopic is gripping. And sad. Even with Prince Charles' witty speeches and responses. Diana was in the public gaze all the time so learnt how to live with it. On the other hand, it must have made it easy for Kristen Stewart to impersonate her accurately in "Spencer" : her coy smile while looking to the sides, biting her lip. Prince Charles - at the time of the release still the prospective king is seen as a deceitful, unfaithful husband, absent from family life, in love of his outdoor pastimes like polo or hunting. Journalists: often sympathetic but sometimes hateful, just like common people. Still, she kept most on her side. In spite of her own illicit affair. The music at the finale stays in your head.

KINO DZIECI (KIDS KINO)

Kino Dzieci Lab developed "Tarapaty" ("Double Trouble") and "Detektyw Bruno" ("Detective Bruno") - the latter didn't fare well in the box office which doesn't surprise me. But the script of "Detektyw Bruno 2" is being written now. "LasseMajas Detektivbyrå" ("The Whodunit Detective Agency") book series is very popular in Poland and the latest movie based on it opened the festival. 159 films in total were screened. Lots came from Europe but some also from Taiwan, Japan, India and a new production from South Korea. Classics of the festival are shown over and over again because because of 9 years of the festival, there's new young audience every year. 3 films had adults' meetings: "Young Plato", one about girls' chances and one on Instagram influences - the protagonist is a girl talking about the business world and addicted viewers. There were 7 free screenings in Ukrainian. Guided tours of the Muranów cinema and nature walks constituted extra events. Only 119 films out of the 159 were online, because of piracy many creators don't allow online screenings shortly after the release. Recorded Q&As, games were popular over the last 2 years. As many as 8 cinemas in Warsaw participated - 5 of them in local cultural centres. Those available online too were clearly marked in the paper and online program.

RECLAIMING AMY

Watchable. It doesn't change the outlook from "Amy" claiming that her love for a wrong guy killed her, yet it's barely mentioned. In this new documentary basically her parents and closest girlfriends disclaim any responsibility for her death, denying neglect. As you see her childhood pictures - she was an ugly child - hear of her teenage exploits and later addictions, you realize she was nervous when sober and only alcohol would offer her relief, a mood shift, some joy. No person is blamed, she's said to have had some mental issues. 

Seen courtesy of Canal +.

LENA  AND SNOWBALL

Recommended. A fictitious tale set and shot in Fitzgerald, Georgia. While both the adult criminals and the school bullies are stereotypical, the plot's so miraculous, it can be treated as a fairy tale for younger teenagers. Lovely, reasonable and talented girl Lena, her adorable dog Smitty, the title little white lion Snowball, friend-in-need Jake, tolerant dad are delightful. And the baddies, however nasty they all are, get their comeuppance. Both types of roles are convincingly acted. The film simply transports you to the period in your life when you believed in justice and happy endings. The epilogue is told together with the brief end credits. 

ドラゴンボー超スーパースーパーヒーロー (DRAGON BALL SUPER: SUPER HERO)

Watchable. This feature-length anime is perfectly satisfactory visually: it retains the manga style, at the same time the pictures change at a good pace and a few animation styles are used, changing smoothly and frequently enough. The plot is fine to some extent. The created world offers a few nice touches, e,g. a car hovering above the road or a dome protecting from rain. The storyline itself is simple but overcomplicated by an excessive number of characters, both historic ones listed in the opening summary of preceding developments and contemporary ones appearing in the film. Repeated fights start dragging at some point. There's a post-credit referring to a game played in the middle of the movie.

BEAST

Recommended. This American adventure-cum-horror set in South Africa chilled me to the bone. The story of a vengeful lion, whose pride was killed by poachers, is realistic. Venda is a real Bantu-family language used in the country, zoological or medical facts make sense. Yet the movie uses horror tropes: the ghost of the deceased wife, close-ups of the lion's attacks, his ominous presence in the dark, the stench in the poacher's shelter, omens like dead bodies and the very opening. Gripping. And the story as well as the way it's told - combing the two genres - like nothing I've seen before. The subtitles are very well translated into Polish by Agata Deka.

The movie has a poster indicating some class B monster flick. I had qualms about going to the movie in the first place.

THE SILENT TWINS

Recommended. Marjorie Wallace from "The Sunday Times" wrote a book based on the true life of the Gibbons twins. The movie's largely based on that book. Set in Wales, it's a dark story, where both the real part and the imagined animal tales are disturbing. The melody of "Tainted Love" precedes the abuse in the love relationship. They created their own world, set apart from the gloom of where they live but even grimmer. It's even more disturbing when in one of their invented stories a dog wags his tail after realizing he's going to be sacrificed. The four lead actors, impersonating the twins at various stages of life, are compelling. So is the mystery behind their odd behaviour. About the most shocking though is the courtroom scene where their youth antics get them sentenced for Broodmoor and locked up with England's most dangerous mentally ill murderers. That keeps you wondering afterwards: does the movie omit something, did the court have grounds for the sentence for real or did racial prejudices or prejudices against the mentally ill run so deep? It's the turning-point of the plot too: freedom versus the lock-up at Broodmoor are the two extremes. Also the way the courtroom and the hospital are shot gave me the creeps - the places are so cold, inhuman, dark, the austere decor reflects limited emotions of the employees of both institutions. The whole film is evocatively shot which creates sombre atmosphere.

ILUZJA (ILLUSION)

Watchable. A Polish psychological drama. I expected something magical but no, it's just the hope parents cling onto when their daughter is missing - the set-up becomes clear after a while. Still, it's a film where you have to guess things since nothing is direct. At the same time, other than going through a number of possible incidents along such a search, nothing extraordinary happens. The 90 minutes drag. While the mother conducts her own investigation, which offers some moments of suspense, it's interspersed with protracted depictions of her musings. It's quiet, apart from some brief music, e.g. in a club, no sounds suggest to you how to feel or what to expect. The title illusion is her glimmers of the hope of finding her daughter, the viewers' illusion is that it may be more than a typical Polish drama.