Polish Film Festival, a 3-day cinema screening with rich cinematic experience from Poland will be held at 6.30 pm from December 2 to 4 at Sausiripaya, Wijerama Mawatha, Colombo-7.

Organised by Embassy of Poland in NewDelhi and Sri Lanka - Poland Business Council, the festival will include films of world renowned Polish filmmakers like Andrzej Wajda who won an honorary Oscar (2000) for his contribution to cinema, and an honorary Golden Bear (2006) at the Berlin Film Festival.
Wajda's 'Katyn' describes the murder of 15,000 Polish officers and the tragedy of a generation. The film follows the story of four Polish families whose lives are torn apart when, at the outset of WWII, a great number of Polish soldiers (who are also fathers, husbands and brothers) fall into the hands of Soviet troops and later brutally become victims of Stalinism. The film also underlines the complicated circumstances of Poland's position both in the war and after.

Filmmaker Andrzej Wajda

A major figure of world and Central European cinema after World War II, Wajda was born on March 6, 1926, in Suwalki, Poland. He described his childhood as a happy pastoral country life before the Second World War. His father, named Jakub Wajda, was captain in the Polish cavalry and died at Katyn massacre in 1940. His mother, named Aniela Wajda, was a teacher at a Ukrainian school.

'Time to Die' directed by Dorota Kedzierzawska is the story of elderly Aniela, the owner of a once beautiful, now run-down wooden villa. After many, many years, she is finally, before our very eyes, seeing her dreams come true - she is finally "freed" of the last tenant, forced upon her by the Communist government after World War II.

At last she is once again the master of her own house. But this beautiful, long-awaited moment is far from what she had hoped. Her only son does not want to move back into his mother's house with his family, nor is he willing to take up its much-needed renovation. Shut off from the world, enclosed in her enormous house, Aniela has constant conversations with her only house mate, companion and guardian - her dog. In the twilight of her days, she must not only face the present, but also the past. Is her life a win or a loss? She never asks herself this question out right. But perhaps we will?

Kedzierzawska is the producer of over 20 films and short movies, some of them received awards at the international film festivals - "Devils, Devils" (9 awards), "Crows" (26 awards including "Coup de coeur" - International Film Festival - Cannes'94).

A scene from Tricks

Filmmaker Andrzej Jakimowski's "Tricks" is a film full of brilliant humor about cars, women and love. It's a story of a boy named Stefek and his older sister. They live together in a small town, somewhere in Poland. Their father left their family many years ago.

They spend time at the railway station and streets looking for happiness and trying to play with the destiny, using tricks. With the happy end.

Gradutated In Philosphy AT the University of Warsaw and directing at Departament of the Radio and Television, University of Silesia in Katowice, Andrzej Jakimowski directed several short and documentary films. His debut "Zmruz oczy" was awarded at several film festivals in Poland and abroad.