ONLINE: Polish Film Festival

press release: The Madison Polish Film Festival is a free annual event organized by the UW-Madison Polish Student Association in collaboration with the Department of German, Nordic, and Slavic+, CREECA, ASM of Madison, Wisconsin Union Directorate (WUD) Film Committee, and the Polish Heritage Club of Madison. The festival hosts a variety of films each year that explore Polish culture and identity as well as support the work of Polish writers and directors. Join us in celebrating Polish artists and visionaries at this year's festival on December 5 and 6, 2020 (entirely online).

This year's films:

Jak najdalej stąd (I Never Cry) 2020: Seventeen-year-old Ola sets off to Ireland to bring her father’s body back to Poland after he dies in a building site accident. But never mind her dad, Ola wants to know if he saved the money for a car he had promised her. Dealing with a foreign bureaucracy in her own streetwise way, Ola finally gets to know the father who had been largely absent in her life.

Żelazny most (The Iron Bridge) 2019: The dramatic story about a love triangle. Coalmine Foreman Kacper begins an affair with the wife of his friend, Oskar, also a miner. He sends Oskar off to work the most distant and dangerous parts of the pit so that he can meet his lover. During one such tryst there’s a collapse at the mine, and Oskar is trapped. The lovers throw themselves into the rescue operation. They deal with feelings of guilt and with the realization that they were the indirect cause of the trapped man’s drama. Their strong feelings for each other further complicate their predicament.

Ikar. Legenda Mietka Kosza (Icarus. The Legend of Mietek Kosz) 2019: Inspired by the true story of the blind piano genius, Mieczylaw Kosz. As a child, Mietek (Mieczyslaw) loses his eyesight, and his mother places him in The Educational Center in Laski outside of Warsaw, a one-hundred-year-old school for the visually impaired. There he discovers music and finds that it is his way coping with the world.  Mietek develops into an excellent classical pianist, but when he discovers jazz, he has only one goal: to become the best jazz pianist in Poland. He becomes more and more successful, not only in Poland, but around the world. He wins the prestigious Montreux Jazz Festival. Unexpectedly, a charismatic vocalist, Zuza, walks into his life, a meeting that will change his life forever.