|
DUZE ZWIERZE
|
 |
Poland
2000 / 35 mm / B&W; / 75 min.
|
|
|
|
|
THE BIG ANIMAL / LE GRAND ANIMAL
In a quiet mountain town, the upright and perfectly respectable bank clerk Sawicki shows up one day leading a camel on a leash. It simply walked into his garden. Had it escaped from a circus? Has someone forgotten it? Sawicki causes a stir; people are shocked. Why a camel, they ask Sawicki, but neither the bank clerk nor his schoolteacher wife Marysia know what to answer. All they know is that they are beginning to like the animal. At first, so do the townspeople; they cheer when Sawicki strolls through town with the beast in tow and Marysia's pupils give it affectionate nicknames. Soon, however, resistance builds among the locals. They complain that the camel is distracting the children at school, polluting the streets and that it may be carrying an African strain of venereal disease. The local bureaucrats think it ought to be licenced, perhaps subject to a special tax. Some parents remove their children from school and Sawicki, who plays the clarinet, is no longer welcome in the town band. On the other hand a camel is an unusual attraction and there are plenty of schemes afoot to make a zloty from its presence, including as a prize in the firemen's lottery. Sawicki and his wife won't have any of it; they love their camel. He defies everyone, even the town council which, after august deliberation, decrees the animal a nuisance. But the animal seems to sense that its presence is controversial and one night, after hearing Sawicki practice his clarinet, it simply disappears...
A low-key absurdist comedy... about the price of individuality and the value of dignity. -- Eddie Cockrell (Variety)
|
|
|
Script: Krzysztof Kieslowski, Jerzy Stuhr. D'apr�s le r�cit/Based on the story: Wielblad. De/By: Kazimierz Orlos.
Phot.: Pawel Edelman.
Ed.: Elzbieta Kurkowska.
Mus.: Abel Korzeniowski.
Cast: Jerzy Stuhr, Anna Dymna.
Prod.: Telewizja Polska, S.A., J.P. Woronicza 17, 00999 Varsovie (Pologne), t�l.: (48-22) 547 8167, fax: (48-22) 547 4225.
Sales: Poltel Enterprises, Telewizja Polska, S.A., J.P. Woronicza 17, 00999 Varsovie (Pologne), t�l.: (48-22) 843 6931, fax: (48-22) 547 7583, e-mail: [email protected].
|
|
Jerzy Stuhr
Born in 1947, Jerzy Stuhr graduated from the Cracow College of Drama and has worked at the Stary Theatre in Cracow as a director since 1971. Over the years he has collaborated on films by some of Poland's top directors, including Andrzej Wajda, and he has developed a wide-ranging acting career in films by Wajda, Agnieszka Holland, Feliks Falk, Juliusz Machulski and, especially, Krzysztof Kieslowski, whose unfinished screenplay he adapted for THE BIG ANIMAL. He made his debut as a film director in 1994 with THE REGISTER OF ADULTERESSES and followed that with LOVE STORIES (1997) and A WEEK IN THE LIFE OF A MAN (1999). |
