Absolutely brilliant. Many regard this as Wajda's, and maybe even Poland's best ever film. Exciting, ceaselessly and unstoppably powerful, acted with herculean guile, fervour and passion. This is quite possibly the most exciting film I've ever seen. The drama, wit and ferocity of the bulk of the film build so, so effectively to its deafening crescendo, the music, the setting, the actors and the camera-work complementing and intertwining with each other in a way quite possibly unmatched in anything else I've seen. And another great think about it is its shameless, paradoxically both subtle and explicit POLITICAL content. This is Wajda's demonstration that however much he may be portrayed as a hero of Poland's rebellion against its socialist regime, he is at the same time sympathetic to the cause which drove Marxism, and hostile to the vulgarities of the interaction of man and money, the dehumanising, reifying assault with which rampant capitalism engages with the human psyche. If this is propaganda, then it is a heartfelt, stunningly effective damasking of the myth with which we all live today.
By the way, I've only seen the re-released version, shorter than the original. Should i also see the longer 1974 version? I think the freshness and crispness of the cinematography in the more recent version might have added to the film.
