Ciclo de Andrzej Wadja en el Chaplin

En parte la aplastante música de Penderecki hizo que contuviéramos la respiración las dos horas y un poco más de duración que tiene Katyn… Salimos del cine literalmente sin aliento…
Dentro y en la salida, pude en dos ocasiones escuchar comentarios aislados acerca de lanzar un “abajo la dictadura” o “abajo Stalin” que no me llamaron la atención pero se quedaron irrealizables, suspendidos en el no-atrevimiento habitual… o quizás el aire acondicionado tan fuerte de la sala les había cerrado la garganta como para ponerse a gritar nada. Como sea, las imágenes de la pesadilla de Katyn serán algo difícil de olvidar…









http://www.wadja.pl

Andrzej Wajda tras los culpables de Katyn.
Oscar 2008: La cinta polaca estuvo nominada a Mejor Película Extranjera.

La pieza cinematográfica, que demoró cinco años en ser filmada, rememora las vivencias del director, que a los 13 años perdió a su padre en Katyn.
Foto:Reuters




El célebre director polaco, hijo de un oficial asesinado en la matanza, reabre una de las heridas más dolorosas de su nación. Desde la 58 edición del Festival de Berlín -donde el filme fue presentado como un gran acontecimiento cinematográfico-, el jefe de producción de "Katyn" habla del que será el último trabajo del octogenario cineasta, basado en la masacre que da nombre a la película.

Evelyn Erlij




"No existe en Polonia una sola familia que no tenga un pariente o conocido muerto en Katyn". Para un país de 38 millones de habitantes, esta afirmación hoy puede resultar excesiva. Sin embargo, más allá del drama que ocultan, las palabras de Raoul Malachowski, veterano polaco de la Segunda Guerra Mundial avencindado en Chile, reflejan la magnitud de la tragedia detrás de "Katyn", uno de los cinco filmes nominados en la categoría de Mejor Película Extranjera en los premios Oscar 2008.



Leyenda del cine europeo Wajda, de 82 años, ostenta una extensa y reconocida carrera que comenzó en la década del 50.







La cinta del premiado director Andrzej Wajda recuerda uno de los pasajes menos conocidos, pero más terribles del pasado de una nación en constante peligro de aniquilación durante su historia. Superando miedos y traumas personales -es hijo de un oficial asesinado en la matanza que da nombre a la película-, Wajda emprendió la tarea de revivir el crimen de unos 20 mil oficiales polacos en el bosque de Katyn durante abril y mayo de 1940. No sólo como una manera de exorcizar su propio dolor, sino también para inmortalizar un crimen político que la Unión Soviética negó durante 50 años, y que, hasta ahora, ningún otro cineasta polaco había osado retratar.

UNA LECCIÓN DE HISTORIA.
La exhibición de "Katyn" en la Bernilale fue también un suceso político, pues contó con la presencia de la canciller alemana, Angela Merkel. En la imagen, una de las escenas de la película.





"Hablar sobre esta difícil verdad fue un problema para muchos cineastas. Por más de 20 años, nadie hizo siquiera el intento de hacer un filme sobre la matanza", comenta Kamil Przelecki, jefe de producción de "Katyn", desde el Festival de Cine de Berlín, donde fue presentada el viernes pasado en la versión 58 del certamen alemán. "Después de años viviendo en la mentira, hacer esta cinta fue tanto una experiencia catártica, como un deber. La desconocimiento de las circunstancias en que un ser querido fue asesinado, es mucho más doloroso que la muerte en sí misma", afirma.

El disfraz de la esvástica

Desde el costado izquierdo de un puente, una multitud angustiada corre para encontrar sorpresivamente a una muchedumbre que viene del extremo derecho gritando "¡los soviéticos nos atacan!"; a lo que del otro lado responden "¿hacia dónde corren?, ¡por acá vienen los alemanes!". Esta escena, que da inicio a la película "Katyn", ilustra la desesperada situación geográfica de Polonia durante el comienzo de la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Unos meses más tarde de la invasión que asoló ambos flancos del territorio polaco, ocurrió la matanza de Katyn.

En la primavera de 1940, entre 15 y 20 mil prisioneros políticos, según las distintas estimaciones, desaparecieron. Las familias los esperaron durante años, sin saber que habían sido acribillados por el Ejército Rojo. Tres años más tarde, en 1943, las fuerzas de ocupación nazi anunciaron el descubrimiento de fosas comunes en los bosques de Katyn, a 18 kilómetros de la ciudad rusa de Smolens.




Polonia obliga a sus soldados a ver la película 'Katyn', de Wadja

04.10.07 -
ENRIQUE MÜLLER



BERLÍN. DV. Katyn fue un nombre prohibido en Polonia mientras duró el régimen comunista, pero cuando llegó la democracia al país, en 1989, Andrzej Wadja, el más famoso director de cine del país, comenzó a madurar una idea que había silenciado durante casi toda su vida: Llevar a la pantalla la masacre cometida por los soviéticos en 1940, cuando asesinaron a unos 22.000 oficiales del ejercito polaco.

«Necesité mucho tiempo para ser capaz de rodar esta película que cuenta también la historia de mi propia familia», dijo el cineasta cuando su película Katyn llegó a los cines de Polonia hace poco más de un mes. El padre del cineasta, el teniente Jakub Wadja, fue uno de los oficiales asesinados con un tiro en la nuca en el bosque de Katyn

La cinta utiliza fragmentos verídicos sacados de los diarios y cartas que llegaron a manos del los familiares de las víctimas, para contar el destino de cuatro oficiales ficticios. A través de ellos, Wadja recrea el trágico pasaje de la historia de su país, que fue atacado desde el Oeste por los nazis el 1 de septiembre de 1939 y 17 días después por el Ejercito Rojo desde el Este, gracias al pacto secreto negociado por Hitler y Stalin.

La masacre de Katyn fue descubierta por el ejercito nazi cuando avanzaba hacia Moscú, pero la propaganda soviética culpó a Hitler de la matanza y castigó con duras penas de cárcel a todos los que se atrevían a mencionar el nombre prohibido. En 1990, Moscú admitió que la policía secreta de Stalin había llevado a cabo la matanza.

«Ningún cineasta sano de espíritu pudo llevar la masacre a la pantalla durante la época comunista. «Mi película muestra también la mentira defendida por el régimen comunista polaco, que siempre atribuyó la masacre a los alemanes».

La cinta Katyn fue seleccionada para competir por el Oscar y, desde ayer la película de Wadja se convirtió en una nueva herramienta de propaganda política destinada a resaltar los «valores patrióticos y morales» de la nación.



Propaganda política

En plena campaña electoral, el Ministerio de Defensa ordenó a los 130.000 soldadosdel Ejército polaco a ver la película de Wadja. «Los soldados deben conocer el precio que un hombre de honor tiene que pagar por el derecho de serlo por sus principios», dijo el portavoz del ministerio, Jaroslaw Rybak, al anunciar la inédita medida.

«Los militares tendrán que asistir a la proyección de la película dentro de las actividades culturales del fin de semana», añadió el portavoz. «La película ayudará a los soldados a entender el honor que entraña servir en el ejercito y defender a la patria».

Pero la orden también puede ayudar a los mellizos Kaczynski, que están enfrascados para seguir detentando el poder en el país. Los mellizos, nunca han ocultado su anticomunismo y desean llevar a cabo una peligrosa caza de brujas en país para castigar a todos los polacos que colaboraron con el régimen.




I just can't stand aside
Barbara Hollender speaks with Andrzej Wajda on the director's eightieth birthday
Published in "Rzeczpospolita" daily on 6 March 2006
Barbara Hollender: So, how do you feel on your birthday?
Andrzej Wajda: I don't know. I don't think I planned it all like this. I'm growing older, which is inevitable. My problem is that a director must be healthy and in great shape so he is available to his crew at any moment. And with each passing year these crews grow larger and larger. So, I'm trying, because I want to make one or two more films, maybe more. I've got so many projects planned.
Is today's cinema still worth the effort? Silly romantic comedies tend to dominate our market...
It's true that in Poland commercial films are beginning to dominate. Audience preferences indicate that pre-war cinema is making a return. This is the cinema we despised so deeply and fought against as the Polish school of film after the war. There's nothing to be done; such silly films are being produced throughout Europe. The key is whether or not the great ideals will return, those ideals which our generation fought for. This is when we were full of hope that we could say something important on screen. To ourselves and the world. I am deeply convinced that the most beautiful cinema is born of this need. Precisely of this need, and not calculation. One has to make films for one's audience, but one has to do it with such belief that later this film can be our voice in the world. Today, films like these are being made in Asia.
Not only. The winner of the last Berlin festival was the Bosnian film by Jasmila Žbanic about Sarajevo, which can't shake off it's war-time trauma. But the Bosnians live in a country that is trying to heal horrific wounds and its filmmakers - Zbanic, Denis Tanovic, Vinco Bresan - know the stories they want to tell. What can we tell the world?
Precisely... if I knew, I'd be making that film and I wouldn't be sitting here talking with you. Profound changes are happening in our country, but they are not making it to the screen.
Why not?
My generation's constant companion has always been literature. It is more disinterested and independent. Screenplays are created for particular directors, for particular actors. Somebody commissions it, and somebody pays for it. The writer is free of such responsibilities. And we've always taken advantage of this. Certainly, contemporary literature is interesting, but today's artists deal with themselves and have turned away from social issues. This is why I feel slightly isolated. I do think, though, that sooner or later the novels we are anticipating will appear since we continuously ask ourselves what is going on in this country.
In Berlin Robert Altman showed the film A Prairie Home Companion, which presents portraits of people that are very nearly from another world - united, friendly, able to understand each other. He said that all films are political in that they reflect who we are, what sustains our lives, what are desires are. Perhaps we are unnecessarily anticipating these political manifests?
We in Poland are in a different situation. We have to declare distinctly on which side we stand, what we intend to do. I know people say that times have changed, that this is one of the reasons we fought for freedom so that artists are not forced into anything. But freedom also has to be learned; unresolved societal issues and the difficulties of emerging from the communist epoch are greater than they first appeared and will haunt us for a long time to come.
Do filmmakers really have to turn to literature? Films based on original screenplays that address political and social issues are produced the world over.
Here, unfortunately, there is a lack of professional screenwriter groups. Most groups have moved to television because that's where the jobs and pay are.
So, without the support of the likes of Iwaszkiewicz, Andrzejewski, Kijowski, and Zulawski you feel helpless today ?
When I reach for topics from the past, I feel utterly helpless. But the lack of literary support is not my sole worry. The past is very difficult to translate into cinema. That world has gone and in order to speak to today's society these stories must be told in a language that it understands. Simultaneously, one has to remain faithful to the truth, to one's self, one's memory and experience. This is why I reflect on how to revive this time. Films like this are made, such as Kolya and Good bye, Lenin to The Downfall and Sophie Scholl: The Final Days. Audiences want to look at the past in order to understand the present. So, I don't give up, I have hope.
Since you also have the expectation of making a film about now, I'd like to ask if you'll be able to find a place in today's reality? Many artists of your generation have stepped aside. Tadeusz Konwicki says openly that this is not his time, while you make efforts to cultivate an understanding of this time.

Absolutely yes. I wouldn't feel good standing aside. For me as a man of the cinema, not being able to communicate with the audience would signify a farewell to film. The film you mentioned by Altman was a real comfort to me. I observed the energy it had been made with. My heart beat stronger, as it was apparent that the artistic temperament can sustain the lives of those who aren't afraid to still make films.
Not so long ago, you proved this with Pan Tadeusz. However, a few films that you have offered up since the transformation period have failed to capture the notice of audiences. How do you yourself evaluate these attempts?
I though that when freedom came I would be able to make films that had been impossible to make previously due to censorship rules. I thought that the public was waiting for them. I didn't realize that my audience had long since left the cinema. A new audience had arrived, and what I had to say was not of interest. This was my experience with The Crowned-Eagle Ring and Holy Week. The latter was a film I had wanted to make with Jerzy Andrzejewski and Andrzej Zulawski in the 1970s. Then it would have been an important thing, profoundly moving.
Today you are preparing to make a film about Katyn.
I have to make this film, as it's missing from my panorama of Polish misfortunes. The film will be ready this year. I want to tell the story of the Katyn tragedy, but also that of the Katyn lie which was fed to us for many years.
You are not the only artist who wants to return to the past. Recently, there has been much discussion about how, financing permitting, films should be made of the Warsaw Uprising and the battle of Monte Cassino.
I see a certain danger here. The desire to show our most recent history to better advantage than we have done to date. I don't think this is a good idea. Does this mean that we won the Battle of Monte Cassino? During the Warsaw Uprising our young people fought bravely to the last drop of blood; does this mean we won? I can't agree with this. Everything we know about society, we learned from our disasters. And it wouldn't be right to persuade our young people that the Warsaw Uprising was a success. Why did the Home Army command make the decision to start the uprising with so little information about their chances of success? The commanders were counting on something, why didn't it come through? These are the questions we need. Years ago I made Canal with a very critical eye of these events. The experiences of the uprising provided us with another way of perceiving the decisions which we were to witness later. Maybe this was why Poles were able to emerge from martial law and move into a new reality peacefully; it had been etched into the consciousness of the Solidarnosc leaders that they could not afford to do anything that might threaten our country with armed conflict.


As an artist, you have made political films that have filled in the blank spaces in our history. But there have also been moments when you were politically active. Why did you decide to do this?
If I called for change in my films, I couldn't desert my country when it needed me and my vote in parliament. This is, after all, the Polish tradition. Artists that take part in the life of their country must, at certain moments, take action.
This tradition has cost us several eminent poets. And you lost several years as an artist. Do you not regret this?
No. When Tadeusz Mazowiecki's government was being created, I had the feeling that I needed to participate in these events. Solidarnosc had no access to television, and it was easier for them to win votes when people appeared whose name said something to the voters. I went to Suwalki and they knew me there. I had the opportunity to campaign against local notables for a senate seat, which was necessary for us. This is how I voted in favor of the transformations initiated by Walesa, Mazowiecki, and Balcerowicz. At the time, this was certainly of more significance than if I had made films.
You don't feel embittered today?
No, we simply thought that the mental transformation in society would happen faster. We thought that there were more people who were as anxious for these changes as we were. On the other hand, we didn't realize that a large portion of our industry would collapse without contracts from the Soviets. It was impossible to adapt giant, antiquated enterprises to market needs while maintaining high employment levels. Walesa needed a Marshall Plan, but the West didn't support us. When subsequent factories and steel mills shut down, it turned out that those who had done the most for Solidarnosc gained the least.
In the cinema the same question keeps surfacing; the same question you answered in Berlin at the press conference: Why were such fantastic films made during the communist years in Poland, and now that everything is free, Polish films are so weak?
In a totalitarian state, in one where fictional elections mean that people have no political representation, artists become their voice. For years and as far as our capabilities, talent, and political situations permitted, we tried to be the voice of Poles. Political cinema requires a large audience. The artist cannot lean out the window and call out to society. How many people will hear? During communism we didn't fight to make political films, we fought only to have them released. Because a whole system of safeguards had been created; this film was released only to arthouse cinemas, and this one was thought up for release only in larger cities. Luckily, cinema workers wanted to have audiences, and so interests were at cross purposes. This worked in our favor, and we found opportunities in the cracks in this system. However, only when speaking to a vast audience could we shape opinion. After Man of Iron had been shown for the first time at a screening in Gdynia, the audience stood and sang the Polish national anthem (Poland has not yet perished). Whatever anyone says about the exaltation of those people, it was an unforgettable experience for the director. Today, this would be unthinkable. Even if there is political tension, much of it is dissipated by television.
Perhaps the audience has had enough? Maybe they feel disillusioned? Maybe they don't want to look at dirt or at politicians posturing for position and power and not for the future of Poland?
Let's remember that society has chosen these politicians, thus, they have the representatives they deserve. Perhaps they fear others? Our role is also to speak of these matters . Still, I continuously doubt whether today people are waiting to hear what artists have to say.
Does it pain you that we have lost such a receptive audience, one that knew how to interpret the most subtle allusions? Today's audiences don't get excited until a shapely, well-known soap starlet runs across the screen in a thong in Ja wam pokaze! (I'll Show You!).
Tickets to the cineplex cost 18 to 20 zloties, and recently cinema has become entertainment for the rich. And the rich don't have such problems. They are not a group of discontents. What can rouse them? Persuade them? They need to relax after a hard day's work. And not only here in Poland. Italian neorealism, French cinema vérité, American dark cinema of the 1950s - these were periods when the cinema held sway over souls. And today?
So, who exactly are you making the film about Katyn for?
I've already told you, I am making it because this event was lacking in my panorama of Polish misfortunes. Sometimes I am surprised just how many people are anticipating this film from me. Neither producers nor distributors are anxious about this topic. Maybe we realize that a society without a past is just a crowd of onlookers. Perhaps the time has come for us to join together?
Yes, but how can the public be persuaded to come to the cinema?
It's not even a problem of entreating the audience to come to the cinema. The difficulty lies in separating the good films from the bad. There are simply too many films. Once we knew that this year Bunuel, Bergman, and Kurosawa would finish films, and that next year Godard's new film would come out.
Perhaps there are no more great masters?
There are masters. It's just that the films get drowned in the flood of titles and the advertising that tempts everyone.
Have there been any films you've seen in recent years that have made you exclaim, "Too bad that's not mine?"
I was thrilled with Almodovar's Talk to Her. But I did ask myself, "Could I have made this film?" No, because we didn't have Bunuel in Poland. And this kind of cinema is born of a different relationship with reality. A wonderful thing. A paradoxical idea, surprising, astounding. I watched that film with the greatest admiration.
And in Poland? Do you envy anyone's film?
No, I don't think so... Maybe I'll switch the question around. There was a moment when I thought, "Thank God, I didn't make that film". Gunter Grass proposed that I film the Tin Drum. Somehow, it didn't work out, then Schloendorff filmed it. When I saw his film, I thought how lucky Grass had been that I hadn't made the film; I wouldn't have found a girl like Katharina Thalbach, or have had the courage to make such erotic scenes.
And you're not envious that Schlöndorff is making a film based on the life of Anna Walentynowicz?
No, I myself encouraged him to undertake this topic. It's good when someone looks at us from a different angle. But in the history of Solidarnosc, Walentynowicz was rather a standard, but not the motor driving events. Anna was a symbol, who enlivened Walesa and a few other Solidarnosc activists who knew what was happening in Poland.
Mr. Wajda, for several years you have been running the Master School of Film Directing in Warsaw. You have an opportunity to observe the youngest generation of filmmakers. What are they like?
They are very interesting people who are very at ease with the camera. We read books, and we thought in literary terms. They are constantly watching the television or the computer screen. While the image is their medium, it is difficult for them give their films a dramatic form. Our education led us to answer questions such as: Who is the hero of my story? Where is he going? What's he about? Unfortunately, they sometimes forget about these questions.
What kind of advice do you give them when you award them their diplomas each year?
It's alway the same advice, "If you are working in Poland, make Polish films, the likes of which they won't make for you in Hollywood. Speak to your public and tell them what is important, but speak in a language of film that they understand."
© Rzeczpospolita 2006
www.rzeczpospolita.pl
We thank editors and publishers of "Rzeczpospolitej" for permission to quote this interview.
Page translated by Jennifer Zielinska
Andrzej Wajda tras los culpables de Katyn.