Popiól i diament (Wajda, 1958)

Popiól i diament (Wajda, 1958) - #TSPDT #118

Two political contract killers find themselves having made a grave mistake and have to correct it now.

Despite all the differences the setup made me faintly think about "In Bruges" and it also has some rather comic similarities, I thought. The script here is far more symbolic and lost me quite a few times due to the rather philosophical ramblings and excursions of the main character. The balance between the comic scene with the drunk men and their strange partying made it feel a bit "eastern" to me.

The story asks a lot of questions in terms of moral and identity. Although the man treats the girl with contempt up to a point, the gravity of the situation sinks in when the viewer realizes that he could have made a much better choice for himself so easily. I also assume that this was very strongly felt by Wajda. The script had a lot of rather unemotional scenes, which worked nicely through their very symbolic set-up(the burning schnaps was a beautiful image).

Definitely a film that deserves a deeper study, especially in relation to the theme and the structure of the script.

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