Posts Tagged ‘Kazimierz Karabasz’
From Powiśle…
Z Powiśla... Poland, 1958, black and white, 10 minsAfter making short films at the Łódź Film School (among them Day In Day Out/Jak co dzień..., 1955) and collaborating with Władysław Ślesicki on Where the Devil Says Goodnight (Gdzie diabeł mówi dobranoc, 1956) and People from an Empty Zone (Ludzie z pustego obszaru, 1957), Kazimierz [...]
The Polish Documentary Movement 1947-60
(This is the text of a presentation I gave at the BFI this afternoon, on the early history of the Polish documentary movement 1947-60 - I've deleted some scene-setting preamble that was only relevant to that particular audience, but otherwise this is pretty much verbatim.)One thing that becomes very clear very quickly when one starts to delve into [...]
People from an Empty Zone
Ludzie z pustego obszaru Poland, 1957, black and white, 15 minsOne of the most immediately striking aspects of Kazimierz Karabasz and Władysław Ślesicki's second collaboration is that they've clearly devoted a lot of thought to the nature and purpose of what they were attempting. Whereas many of the films made in the first year of the 'black [...]
Where the Devil Says Goodnight
Gdzie diabeł mówi dobranoc Poland, 1956, black and white, 11 minsThe first professional film by then recent film-school graduates Kazimierz Karabasz and Władysław Ślesicki, Where the Devil Says Goodnight is considered one of the key films of the 'black series' of documentaries that opened a debate about Poland's social problems in the [...]
Railway Junction
Węzeł Poland, 1961, black and white, 10 minsIn terms of conception and execution, Railway Junction is clearly part of the group that also includes the previous year's The Musicians and People on the Road. Once again, there's an abiding concern with presenting the lives of working people, though this time there's no distracting element of [...]
People on the Road
Ludzie w drodze Poland, 1960, black and white, 10 minsA companion-piece to Kazimierz Karabasz' The Musicians/Muzykanci (1960), and made at roughly the same time, People on the Road takes a similar approach to circus folk. Both films look at what happens between performances - in The Musicians' case, it's a band rehearsal, while People on the [...]
The Musicians
Muzykanci Poland, 1960, black and white, 9 minsWhen Sight & Sound magazine ran the fifth of its decennial critics' Top Ten polls of what was alleged to be the best films ever made, they extended the invitation to filmmakers for the first time. As one of the leading arthouse cinema lights at the time (1992) Krzystof Kieślowski's list came [...]
Day In Day Out
Jak co dzień... Poland, 1955, black and white, 12 minsMade as a Łódź Film School project, Day In Day Out, Kazimierz Karabasz' lyrical portrait of the daily morning journey of Warsaw's suburban commuters, has hardly dated at all: my fellow Londoners will find themselves nodding in recognition on numerous occasions, even if hanging onto the [...]