Roma Gąsiorowska in Leszek Dawid's "My Name is Ki", photo: Skorpionarte
A film that took its director into the realm of night clubs and late parties, My Name Is Ki is Leszek Dawid's story of an ambitious woman who tries to be a mother and not give up on her lifestyle, and comes to cinemas in France.
Proving his skill in depicting human struggles in the 21st century, in My Name Is Ki from 2011, director Leszek Dawid portrays a twentysomething, free-spirited woman who does not want to follow in her mother’s footsteps by devoting herself entirely to being a mother. She no longer wants to live with the father of her child, and decides to move out. The responsibility of parenting on her own juxtaposes Ki's need to work and her wish to live a carefree life. She’d like the boy’s father involved but caring for his child isn’t on his agenda. She takes her son, Pio, to an art studio where she’s a nude model, where he disrupts the atmosphere and nearly gets Ki fired. At night, she leaves him with friends so she can go out partying.
The film follows her path to maturing, loving and being responsible for herself and her son. "A young mother manipulates and exploits others to get time away from her kid and stay afloat financially," a Variety review says. "Although her character is frequently badly behaved, comely star Roma Gąsiorowska manages to make her titular character sympathetic, even sort of likeable, and the pic offers an energetic portrait of contemporary youth culture in urban Poland".
In the film, Roma Gąsiorowska, an "extremely talented actress who tends to overdo things" as Bartosz Staszczyszyn writes in an article for culture.pl, found a balance for the role "thanks to Leszek Dawid's supressing of Gąsiorowska's energy, with a bewildering effect". As Aneta Kyzioł writes in the weekly Polityka, "It’s one of the most interesting and most realistic portrayals of a contemporary young woman in Polish cinema in recent years". Gąsiorowska received the Golden Lion at the Gdynia Festival of Polish Feature Films for her role as the emotionally unstable young woman, and the Golden Duck for Best Actress from Film magazine, the oldest Polish film award, given out since 1956. Adam Woronowicz and Krzysztof Ogłoza, who play Ki’s partners, were also nominated for Golden Duck awards. The movie was warmly received in Venice, where it was presented as part of the Venice Days festival.
In French the film is called Je m'appelle Ki. See more: www.aramisfilms.fr
Sources: culture.pl, CineEurope, Albany Films International, Steve Belgard for Denver Film
Editor: Marta Jazowska