Polish candidate for the Oscar, “In Darkness” – a film by Agnieszka Holland, proved to be the best at 23rd Polish Film Festival in America, just ended in Chicago.

“In Darkness”, the latest film by internationally-acclaimed director Agnieszka Holland, is a Polish entry for the Academy award in a Foreign Language category.

Holland’s film takes place in Poland during the Second World War. It tells the story of Leopold Socha (played by Robert Więckiewicz), who helped the Jews to hide from the Germans in the sewers of Lvov. The man, caring only for his own interests who, before the war, spent some time in jail for stealing, decides to help the innocent people and transforms from a criminal to a hero. Robert Więckiewicz has received a special award for his role.

During the festival “Golden Alpenstocks”are also awarded for promoting the Polish cinema in North America. This year the winners were well-known in the U.S. film critics: Zbigniew Banaś and Michael Wilmington.

Polish Film Festival in America is the largest review of Polish cinema abroad. For two weeks in seven different movie theaters in Chicago, viewers saw over one hundred films, both feature films and documentaries. They were judged by a specially selected jury panel.

Do następnego razu… (Till next time…)