Still from Waldemar Krzystek's "80 Million", photo:
Jarosław Sosiński / Kino Świat
Presenting a hopeful and challenging episode of Polish history, the film chosen as the Polish candidate for the 2013 Academy Award in the Best Foreign Language Film category carries a universal and optimistic message
A motion picture filled with "optimism and the belief that honesty, intelligence and truth in the end defeat lies, sheer power, and 'red' shenanigans", as comments its director Waldemar Krzystek, 80 million tells the story of the courage of five Polish activists who under the strict supervision of the security police withdraw 80 million złoty from trade union accounts hours before the union’s accounts were blocked, on the eve of the imposition of martial law in Poland in December 1981. The money helped organise Solidarity’s legendary underground activities over the coming years. During martial law activists who stood up against the regime died at the hands of the Soviet army, Solidarity witnessed arrests of its members and forfeiture of property. Nevertheless, the movement survived, and eight years later, its members would attend the Round Table talks and were on the ballots during the first semi-free Polish elections on the 4th of June 1989. The heroes Waldemar Krzystek's movie are in no small way coresponsible for Solidarity's success.
The action is set in the south-western "city of youth" - Wrocław, one of the strongholds of the Solidarity movement known for its cultural ties with Germany and its unique role in the defeat of communism. Waldemar Krzystek comment,
A film about people who had to change several times in order to alter the situations in which they found themselves. For example withdrawing that amount of cash from the bank and realising that the bag they brought with them was far too small! They planned everything down to the minutest detail, but they did not know – could not have known, since they had never seen so much money in one place – that in order to carry this amount of money one would not only need three suitcases, but also a large backpack.
80 million came to Polish cinemas in November 2011 where it met with high ratings, its international premiere took place at the 34th International Film Festival in Moscow in June 2012. The 2013 Oscar nominees are to the announced on January 15th 2013, with the 85th Award ceremony taking place on February 24th 2013. Poland's 2011 entry in the Best Foreign Language Film category – Agnieszka Holland’s In Darkness – was among the ultimate five films nominated for the Academy Award.
Sources: culture.pl, thenews.pl
Editor: Marta Jazowska