The auteur cinema of Agnieszka Holland. 

          Alison Butler in her book defines the term of women's cinema :„ films that might be made by, addressed to, or concerned with women, or all three. It is neither a genre nor a movement in film history, it has no single lineage of its own, no national boundaries, no filmic or aesthetic specificity, but traverses and negotiates cinematic and cultural traditions and critical and political debates”. (1) These words are quintessence of the role of Agnieszka Holland in the world cinematography. She does not represent any specific womens' film school or feministic cinema but as a great auteur creates discussion about women's cinema as continuity that opens dialogue with different works or offering new answers for universal, repeated questions. Agnieszka Holland is the example Teresa de Laurentis wrote about: „The importance of narrative cinema as a mode of working through the relations of female subjectivity, identity and desire cannot be understated”. (2)

This is how the Polish director described herself in the long interview she gave in 2002: : And why no-indefinite identity? Maybe it is my personal issue, maybe it origins inside me, maybe because who I am. The woman performing a masculine profession, half-Polish, half-Jew, I live here or there, as half-alien.” She points out her position as the film director: „The key fact is I was a woman, and it put me in worse position immediately”.(3)

 

         Her way to become one of the most known Polish director was not easy. After the high school she chose Prague Film Academy because of the anti-Semitism promoted by communists in Poland in 1960s. She recalls the atmosphere toward herself and her female colleagues there: „There was reluctance which we only felt, because nobody dared to admit there is no equality of opportunity” (3). She begun her carrer, as most female graduates, at the side of older male directors. Her determination to realize the professional plans and ability to manage the film set became legendary and ridiculed by the male directors.

 

        Agnieszka Holland is an excellent representantive of the auteur cinema. She wrote many of the screenplays she filmed. The most important subject in the Holland's movies is human and his various complicated, difficult relations. She explores different environments, opportunities in which one can fulfill. Her characters try to achieve the feeling of fulfilment but this illusion is usually taken away. They have to make intractable choices. She does not hesist to broach controversial issues as social alienation or political and religious matters.

        Her first major film was „Aktorzy prowincjonalni” („Provincial actors”)- the chronicle of backstage relations including the challenge of debut and efforts to come to terms with both professional and personal life. The film won the International Critics Prize at the 1980 Cannes Film Festival.

Kobieta samotna ("A Lonely Woman", 1981) is a tragic love story of two fragile and straight people rejected by society, desperately seeking the affection. But the overwhelming reality doesn't give them any chance to break free from the tragic fate. This film is the first of many touching the issue of love and the relationship between two people. „The relationships I show are usually difficult ones. They are not lyrical. Because bad relationships seem more interesting to the movie narration. My love affairs are hot and cold in the same time.” (3). 

 

    

The first Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film Holland received for her ”Gorzkie żniwa” („Angry Harvest, 1985) a German production trying to tackle with World War II, to show different attitudes in the face of fatal danger and complicated, abusive relations between more and less persecuted.

    

The love affair of XIX poets Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlain shown in „Całkowite zaćmienie” („Total eclipse”,1995), the relation full of brutality and emotional tensions prompted Holland to confide „It doesn't matter that this is love between two men. I am touched by those carrying their ugliness and desperately fighting over their place in the love world” (3).

„Plac Waszyngtona” („Washington Square”, 1997) shows unhappy love between shy, full of complexes Catherine and poor but handsome young man. The film brings back the XIXth century time when women without money and beauty did not have the right to love.

„Kopia mistrza” („Copying Beethoven”, 2006) is the picture of the unusual relation between old and most eccentric composer Ludvig van Beethoven and his young copyist Ann, the relation which change the life of them both.

From time to time the the metaphysical world enters to Holland's work. First signals were present in „Olivier Olivier” („Olivier, Olivier”,1991) and in „Tajemniczy ogród” (The secret garden”, 1993)- her only movie made for younger viewers.

The real fascination of religious attitudes and psychic, miraculous phenomena occured in „Trzeci cud” („The third miracle”, 1999) and „Julia wraca do domu” („Julie walking home”, 2001). The characters and the presented world open to metaphysical experiences but while asking the metaphysical questions the director avoids the direct answers.

     Agnieszka Holland does not escape from historical and political issues which influence her characters. „Gorączka” („The fever”, 1980) tells about Polish revolutionists and anarchists in 1905 in which the narrative pivot is, passed along to consecutive people, the bomb. The film demonstrates the still actual danger of terrorism and fanatism when the individual is of little value. „Zabić księdza” („To Kill a Priest”, 1988), a political drama, is based on the true story of father Jerzy Popieluszko kidnapped and killed by Polish communist special agents. The director tried to understand the behaviour of the victim and the killer and outline the deep political conflict between the authorities and the society leading to confrontation. 

 

        The international acclaim received the film „Europa, Europa” („Europe, Europe”, 1990)- the fabular biography of Solomon Perel, a Jewish teenager of German origin who after the outbreak of World War II fled to the Soviet-occupied section of Poland and later captured by Germans convinced a German officer that he was German and found himself enrolled in the Hitler Youth.

Agnieszka Holland newest fabular film „W ciemności” („In the darkness”, 2011), her third Oscar nomination, is the true WWII story of saving Jews by a Polish smart-ass, thief Leopold Socha.

She breaks many stereotypes escaping from political correctness- the main character and the group of 21 Jews living in canals are normal people- they are guided by survival instinct, but also by desire of taking advantage of life, the sexual attraction with all the effects.

     

         Holland is a comprehensive artist. The director tries successfully to bring serious issues to television series. In 2012 she made „Horzici kerz” („Burning bush”) for HBO- three episode story about Jan Palach, a student who burnt himself in 1969 in Czechoslovakia protesting against the passivity of his countrymen after the Soviet invasion.

1. A. Butler, „Women’s cinema: the contested screen”. Londyn 2000, p.1
2. T. de Lauretis, “Rethinking Women’s Cinema: Aesthetics and Feminist TheoryNew German Critique, No. 34 (Winter, 1985), pp. 154-156   
3.  Agnieszka Holland „Magia i pieniądze. Rozmowy przeprowadziła Maria Kornatowska