NOVEMBER 22: IDA
Dir: Pawel Pawlikowski POLAND, 2013
Polish with English subtitles 80 minutes
Principal Cast: Agata Kulesza, Agata Trzebuchowska
In Poland, few subjects are as controversial and emotionally
charged as the relations between Catholics and Jews during the Nazi
occupation. Following his success in England with films like Last Resort
and My Summer of Love, director Pawel Pawlikowski
has returned to his native country for the first time in his career to
address one of his homeland’s most sensitive topics. The result is one
of the year’s most powerful and affecting films. In 1960s Poland, Anna
is a novitiate nun about to take her vows. Instructed
by her Mother Superior to visit her aunt prior to withdrawing into the
religious life, the prim Anna meets her mother’s sister Wanda, a
raven-haired sensualist and former state prosecutor, who reveals some
heretofore unknown information about Anna’s past— including
her real name, Ida.
This launches a remarkable journey into the countryside, where
secrets both familial and national are darkly, inextricably intertwined.
Shooting in black and white and using the 1.37:1 Academy ratio (the
almost-square frame of classic cinema), Pawlikowski
crafts a masterful drama which balances the intimate and personal with
the world-historical. As the two women unearth ever more details about
their family’s painful past, their search illuminates some of the
darkest corners of Poland’s history.
The trailer:
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