Zieja

After having gone to see Tenet (2020) the day before I spoke to a friend on the phone about what other films were coming out. Getting told that the local Odeon were doing a one-off screening of a interesting-sounding Polish Drama later that day,I got set to meet Zieja.

Note:Some spoilers in review.

View on the film:

On opposing sides not only round the table, but also morally, Andrzej Seweryn and Zbigniew Zamachowski set the screen ablaze in Zieja and Grosicki's interrogation sequences, thanks to the stamping of feet frustration Zamachowski gives Grosicki being counted in this psychological duel with a upright, quiet confidence Seweryn has beaming from every word of Zieja.

A important figure sadly not that well known outside of Poland, the screenplay by Wojciech Lepianka spans a impressively compact bio-pic on Jan Zieja, going right back in flashbacks to Zieja's involvement in the Warsaw Uprising,to the 70's,where Zieja's liberal liturgical catches the attention of the Communists secret services.

Based around the interrogation with Zieja and Grosicki, Lepianka's consistent move to flashbacks gives what should be the centrepiece of the title a stop-start atmosphere, where just as tensions are starting to build, Lepianka steps back and enters a flashback.

Rolling up the opening sequence to Grosicki being a slob in bed, director Robert Glinski & cinematographer Witold Plociennik firmly place Zieja on the other side with graceful close-ups and splintered shadows casting a spiritual aura on Zieja.

Closely working with editor Ewa Smal, Glinski stylishly links Zieja's experience at the interrogation table with the horrors he's faced in life,via pristine match-cuts linking the flashbacks and the present into each other,along with eye-catch screen-wipes performed by Zieja walking across the screen to deliver a sermon.