War Well Appreciated

Barbara Lena Gierszewska

Abstract

A book review of Małgorzata Hendrykowska’s Polish film on war and occupation. Topics, themes, questions (Film polski wobec wojny i okupacji. Tematy, motywy, pytania, 2011). Gierszewska notes that the author presents a multi-threaded discussion of World War II as seen through the film lens, and also presents a new and ordered interpretation of Polish film productions on war since the end of World War II to the present day, taking into the account historical and political contexts. The reviewer believes that the book is interesting and Hendrykowska presents us with a work rich in facts, reliable from the scientific point of view, objective and interpretively tailored to the needs of modern education in the field of World War II in Polish cinema. Importantly, Hendrykowska re-read the film content ignoring the false messages of political propaganda. The reality of war and occupation, presented free of ideology, one of the most important topics in Polish cinema in the period of 1945-2010, is thus presented and re-described from a new perspective. So far Polish film studies literature and teaching lacked a multifaceted attempt to reconstruct the complex issues of World War II and the wartime occupation as seen through the prism of the film. Małgorzata Hendrykowska fills this gap.