Formal Film Study: Last 3 Oscar Nominated Polish Films

For this film study, I was interested in foreign films. I have seen a few French films and really liked those. At the Oscars, a Polish film took the award for best foreign language film, and that piqued my interest because it would fall in the foreign category but would be something different. Going off that film, I decided to watch the last three Oscar nominated Polish films. So for this project I watched, Ida (2014) directed by Pawel Pawlikowski, In Darkness (2011) directed by Agnieszka Holland, and Katyn (2007) directed by Andrzej Mularczyk. 

Ida is set in 1960 and follows the story of a young girl who was raised Catholic in a convent, Right before she is about to say her vows to become a nun, she finds out she has one living relative, her aunt, which she did not know about. While visiting her aunt, she finds out that her real name is Ida (growing up it was Ana), she is actually Jewish. and her parents were killed during World War II. Her and her aunt then set out to find out the truth about the death of her parents. (below)


In Darkness is  the true story of a Polish sewer worker during WWII who, for payment, hides a group of Jewish people for fourteen months in the sewers from the Germans after they invaded Poland.

Katyn is based on the mass murder of 22,000 Polish army officers and POWs that were killed in the Katyn forest by Soviet forces after they took over Poland. The movie profiles four fictional families who try to uncover the truth about their loved ones death because they were fed false information about who really killed them.

One of the most obvious similarities and biggest "discovery" of these three movies is what they are based on: World War II and the Germans. Each of them show a different type of story, but all with a common factor. Culturally, this shows just how much of an effect that part of history had on their country.  By showing the different types of stories, these movies touched on all the different people that were affected. Ida shows how the kids of those that were taken by the Germans were affect even after the war was over. In Darkness showed one the the most noted with the Jewish and Katyn showed how the Polish armed forces were affected and their families. Poland played huge role in the war and the fight among many different forces. These movies show that this is something they hold on to, and will forever. They are all directed by different people, and that in itself demonstrates the importance of this event for them. This time in history is something the world will never forget, and for Poland especially it will always stand out because they were almost a puppet to the greater forces during that time.

One of the other things I noticed across all three films was the emphasis on religion. In Ida, she had been raised Catholic, but there is a struggle between her and her aunt because her aunt is still Jewish. Neither of them really understand each other's views. In Darkness, the sewer worker, Poldek (left), is a Catholic man and as far as religion goes, doesn't have to fear German persecution, but the people he is helping have a different story. Unlike Ida and her aunt, there is no push and pull between the two religions in In Darkness, but instead Poldek is just being a good man and helping out good people given their circumstances. Katyn is the one that differs the most. There is a heavier emphasis on the Catholic religion, without any mention of Judaism. All the Polish soldiers appear to be Catholic, therefore all their loved ones left behind are Catholic. A few times as well, a priest is seen blessing those who have been injured. This factor in all the movies suggests that in general, religion is very important in Polish culture regardless which one it is. Furthermore, during those times, religion is what got people through the hard times. I also think that for the first two films, the movies are trying to convey the idea the even though the two groups have different beliefs, there is this one thing that unites them and is part of both their histories as one country.

Looking away from the culture aspect of these movies, there are some interesting style elements in all three. To start, color was used differently in these films. Ida stood out the most because it was all black and white. I feel this was done because of the time period it was set in. Also the whole movie was very sullen and quiet, so it seems as though the color fit with the sound of the movie. Both In Darkness and Kaytn were in color, but the palette was very neutral to darker colors. The use of that fits with both the stories very well because they were both very dark and depressing.

Sound was used very interestingly in these films. In Ida, there was rarely music. When there was, it was very quiet and the source of it was a radio or some type of music player controlled by the characters. For example, Ida and her aunt were in the car a lot when on their journey, and the aunt would turn on the radio. Similarly, In Darkness used more music, but it was background music to help the mood, and like the other, it was very quiet and was not focused. Katyn was different because it used a lot of background music for the mood. However, I feel like the music did not always match what was going on. In one scene, one of the characters finds out her husband's name was not on the death list, and despite this great news, the music was very mysterious and creepy.

Some smaller editing things I notices were shots. In all three movies, there were a lot of close ups on the characters. They were rarely ever far away from the character that was talking or of focus for any given moment. Another thing more specific to In Darkness and Katyn (right) was the close ups on the deaths. In the former, two of the main characters killed a German soldier by beating him, and after  the camera really focused on not only the solider but the wound and blood. In the latter, when it showed all the Polish soldiers being killed, first the camera focused on the face and emotion of each soldier (because they were all killed one by one) and it stayed there while the Soviets shot them in the head. One thing I picked out in Ida was a transition that was particularly different than was expected. After their excursion, the aunt became very depressed and ended up committing suicide. From my experience when a character dies in a movie, it usually cuts to the funeral. In this particular movie, the funeral did not come until a few scenes later.

After viewing all these films and being overwhelmed and depressed, I decided to look at some of the numbers to see what others thought of these films. On Rottentomatoes.com all three got good reviews from the critics: Ida with 98%, In Darkness with 88%, and Katyn with 92%. The audience for Ida and Katyn felt a little different towards them, almost a 20% difference for both, while In Darkness only had an 8% difference in scores. Overall, though, all three films made big impressions are everyone, and offered stories that are strong in many people's memories and will last forever.