Grazyna Szapolowska

Political and sexual repression in Hungary, just after the revolution of 1956. In 1958, the body of Eva Szalanczky, a political journalist, is discovered near the border. Her friend Livia is in hospital with a broken neck; Livia’s husband, Donci, is under arrest. In a flashback to the year before, we see what leads up to the tragedy. Eva gets a job as a writer. She meets Livia and is attracted to her. Livia feels much the same, but as a married woman, has doubts and hesitations. In their work, they (and Eva in particular) bang up against the limits of telling political truths; in private, they confront the limits of living out sexual and emotional truth.Read More »

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Set during Martial Law in Poland and centers on the young widow of an attorney who defended activists during political trials. The woman finds herself unable to deal with her husband’s death. The spirit of the departed intervenes in her life and the widow constantly feels this presence. Her longing for her deceased husband ultimately leads her to commit suicide. The storyline of the heroine’s personal experiences is intertwined with that centering on the political trial of a young worker. In the film, Kieślowski offers a series of reflections on the political stance of society and the professional ethics of lawyers.Read More »

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A beautiful, melancholy film set in the nineteenth century but with obvious contemporary reverberations, Flowers of Reverie recently won the important Silver Bear (Special Jury Prize) at the Berlin Film Festival ’85. The story tells of a family divided by political antagonisms and allegiances in the years following the defeat of the 1848-49 Hungarian Revolution and War of Independence against imperial Austria. Ferenc Majlath, an ex-soldier who participated in the revolution, now allies himself with his exiled commanding officer to the dismay of his uncle, the family patriarch who is a supporter of the Emperor Franz Joseph. In a country littered with secret police eager to ferret out supporters of the failed rebellion, Ferenc is soon jailed; when he refuses to sign a confession and exhibits signs of extreme depression, he is committed to an insane asylum. Read More »