THE CANAL  [1956]

THE CANAL

year:

1956

release date:

20 IV 1957

runtime:

91 min

directed by:

Andrzej Wajda

written by:

Jerzy Stefan Stawiński based on his own short story

director of photography:

Jerzy Lipman

cast:

Teresa Iżewska [Stokrotka (‘Daisy’)], Tadeusz Janczar [Jacek Korab], Wieńczysław Gliński [Lt. Zadra], Tadeusz Gwiazdowski [Sergeant Kula], Stanisław Mikulski [Smukły], Emil Karewicz [Lt. Mądry], Władysław Sheybal [Michał, the composer], Teresa Berezowska [Halinka], Zofia Lindorf [woman looking for her daughter], Jan Englert [Zefir], Kazimierz Dejunowicz [Cpt. Zabawa], Zdzisław Leśniak [Mały]

edited by:

Halina Nawrocka

music by:

Jan Krenz

production design:

Roman Mann

produced by:

Studio Filmowe

executive producer:

Stanisław Adler

awards:

• IFF Cannes(France) 1957: Special Jury Award

•World Festival of Youthand Studentsin Moscow(Soviet Union)1957:Gold Medal

•Golden Duck1958

•IFFIbadan(Nigeria) 1961: Diplomaof Recognition

•IFF Riode Janeiro(Brazil) 1961:awardof the Brazilian Association ofFilm Critics

About the film

The first film dedicated to the tragedy of the Warsaw Uprising and the Home Army soldiers, starting a trend soon to be named the Polish Film School. The work, full of expressive, metaphoric images, united a romantic philosophy with the theme of Polish death.

Warsaw, 1944. The Uprising is coming to an end. After a failed attempt to break through the German lines, Lieutenant Zadra’s company enters the sewage canals at the corner of Bałuckiego and Szustra streets in Mokotów. They are headed toward downtown, but out of more than forty insurgents not one will survive.

The unit is soon broken into three smaller groups wandering blindly around the stinking bowels of the capital. Daisy, a liaison, and the wounded Korab, are trapped by the barred exit at the mouth of the canal; Halinka commits suicide; composer Michał succumbs to insanity. Mądry finds an exit at Dworkowa street, before getting captured by a German patrol. After wandering through the canals for 17 hours, Zadra, Kula and Smukły finally find the right hatch. The Corporal is killed while disarming booby trap grenades hanging at the entrance, and Zadra returns to the canaltohis soldiers, not knowing that they had all shared Mądry’s fate.

.

Jan Słodowski, Leksykon polskich filmów fabularnych, Warszawa 1996

Articles

  • The Canal

    Marek Hendrykowski

    50 Years of Polish Film School, Warsaw 2008

  • That Which is Absent

    Karolina Kosińska

    „Kwartalnik Filmowy” – Special Issue 2013: “Polish Film Scholars on Polish Cinema”

  • Bodiless Enemy

    Rafał Marszałek

    „Kwartalnik Filmowy” – Special Issue 2013: “Polish Film Scholars on Polish Cinema”