Still from Marcin Koszałka's "Lust Killer", photo: Michał Sosna.
Entering its 53rd edition, the historic festival is the country's annual hotspot for new films from known directors and those who are less recognised. The festival buzzes in 2013 with premiere showings by Duda, Koszałka and Stasik.
Presenting 32 films competing for the Golden Lajkonik award, the Polish section is one of the Kraków Film Festival's four competitive sections. The section comprises documentaries, shorts and animations made in Poland. Among the most-known names are documentary filmmakers Lidia Duda, Marcin Koszałka and Marcel Łozińskil, each presenting their newest works at the 2013 festival.
Lidia Duda, who garners international prizes for her documentary Entangled, took home the Golden Lajkonik for that film at the festival in 2012. This year, she comes to Kraków with Wszystko jest możliwe / Everything Is Possible. Dealing more often than not with topics that concern the oppressed, the grieving, the marginalised, with this film she went for something more joyful. Everything Is Possible was meant to be a story about how it is never too late to make dreams come true.
Duda's protagonist, Teresa Bancewicza, lost her job at age 65 and fell into a depression. The doctor advised her to start hospital treatment, or to change scenery. She went on a journey to Scandinavia, hitchhiking her way north. In the same way, she then saw North America, South America, Asia and Africa. Duda tells culture.pl,
When I met her I thought: finally a film with no tones of grey, full of spontaneity and joy. I started going deeper into the topic. Today, my protagonist is still smiling but the film isn’t that positive any more. The film became a confession: for the protagonist and her husband. There is also him, Mrs Teresa’s new love. The film is no longer that cheerful, but I think it’s wiser.
Another Golden Lajkonik contender, Marcin Koszalka, the documentary filmmaker who gained fame thanks to his controversial debut, Such a Beautiful Son I Gave Birth To (1999), and the Silver Gentian at the 59th edition of the Trento Film Festival for the 2010 film Declaration of Immortality, presents Lust Killer.in Kraków.
Three cases, three serial killers, one motif: sex. Joachim Knychała, who is no longer alive, committed 5 murders. His diary depicts his own point of view about the crimes, and a 6-hour-long interrogation helps disclose his motives. Red Spider, who has been living in a special psychiatric penitentiary for 46 years, lives a detached life, immersed in artistic ambitions. The third convict is a brutal 4-time murderer who left prison 2 years ago and now, at age 60, lives an easy life in Ostróda with his old parents. Lust Killer aims to portray the human being as an entity fascinated by death, sex and murderers whose essence consists in attempting to broach boundaries.
Also on the Kraków schedule are Paweł Łoziński's Ojciec i syn / Father and Son and Marcel Łoziński's Ojciec i syn w podróży / A Father and Son's Journey, both the result of a camper trip the two brothers took to France, and Piotr Stasik's Dziennik z podróży / Diary From a Trip, which captures a student and his master - Tadeusz Rolke, the forerunner of Polish photojournalism, widely known for his photographs of wartime Warsaw.
For more information on the festival see: Krakow Film Festival 2013
Author: based on the original text by Bartosz Staszczyszyn, written by MJ 02.05.2013
Sources: DOKweb, Krakow Film Festival, Polish Docs, Film New Europe, culture.pl