Points of view
'I was lucky enough to work with different artists', Englert says, 'so that I can look at film and the world from different directions. I think life experience translates into artistic maturity.'
Before he set foot on the set of 33 Scenes From Life, Englert took part in one of the most interesting projects in his career so far. One day, Karl Baumgartner, a famous producer from Italy, invited Englert to a meeting with Pan Nalin, a director of Indian descent residing in Paris. The principal photography of Valley of Flowers was to start in a few weeks, and Nalin still did not have a cinematographer. 'We looked into each others eyes, and decided that we will go along this path. Fate decided: Two people met and found that you need to trust each other and make a film.'
A few weeks later Englert flew to India. For five months he worked on the film set in the Himalayas, then spent another month in Tokyo. The result of this collaboration was Valley of Flowers, a spectacular melodrama in which adventure cinema is coupled with a mystical tale of love, passion and reincarnation. This was a good period in Englert's career, as he told Culture.pl,
In retrospect, I believe that work of 'Valley of Flowers' was an interesting life experience. I have a few reservations about the film, but the opportunity to learn a new culture and work with an international team was an amazing experience.
After that, the success of 33 Scenes From Life made Englert one of the hottest names among Polish cinematographers. Work proposals poured in. In 2009, Jacek Borcuch offered him a job on All That I Love, a nostalgic story of youth in the communist-era People's Republic of Poland. The two filmmakers worked again on the set of Borcuch's Lasting in 2011. The cinematographic vision, colour and light saturation were an integral part of the narration. Englert often teetered on the verge of overexposing the negative, thus showing the emotional intensity of the characters. In the second part of the film, he portrayed the breakdown of interpersonal relationships through a grim portrayal of Kraków landmarks bathed in sullen greys and rotten greens.
The film won Englert the Best Cinematography award at the Sundance Film Festival 2013, the most prestigious independent film festival in the world. 'I was certainly glad that someone appreciated my work, but I myself have not changed by the fact that I got the award. I am the same man', Englert said.