Celebrated Polish filmmaker Andrzej Wajda takes the helm for this Oscar-nominated drama detailing the harrowing events surrounding the 1940 massacre of captured Polish army officers in the Katyn Forest. A unique blend of conventional narrative and documentary-style filmmaking, Katyn opens in the spring of 1940, just as the Soviet Secret police execute a group of Polish officers. On September 1, 1939, Germen forces had descended upon Poland, paving the way for the Red Army to occupy east Poland
as part of the Hitler-Stalin pact. As the Red Army assumed control of east Poland, all officers in the Polish army were placed in Soviet custody. Determined to remain loyal to the army despite the growing danger, Polish officer Andrzej refuses to flee with his wife, Anna. It isn't long before invading forces begin arresting professors in Cracow, and as the detainees languish in prison camps, their families start to fear that they'll never see their loved ones again. Flash forward to April 1943, and the Germans announce the discovery of mass graves. While Anna is relieved not to hear her husband's name on the list of bodies discovered, countless others are left to grieve their losses with no explanation or consolation. January 18, 1945: Cracow is liberated by the Red Army, and propagandist newsreels from the Soviet Union blame German forces for the massacre at Katyn. It is at that point that the fine line between collaboration and resistance within the People's Republic of Poland becomes exceptionally blurred. As the details surrounding the massacre gradually begin to emerge, Wajda reveals precisely how this horrifying massacre unfolded by flashing back to the spring of 1940 for an extended sequence in which Polish officer internees are transported by railroad to Smolensk and methodically dispatched before being casually buried in a mass grave. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi
The great filmmaker's urge to show generations of his countrymen what they were told not to think about is what moves him, and while "Katyn" rises above didacticism, you can feel the director keeping his emotions in check throughout.
Oscar-winning Polish writer/director Andrzej Wajda is now 83 years old. But he thankfully hasn't lost his ability to outrage viewers for all the right reasons.
Andrjez Wajda, whose father was one of the officers killed in Katyn, uses the event to explore some of the unhealed wounds suffered by the Poles in World War II.
Delivering an emotional punch to the gut in the final reel, this engaging account of an under-reported tragedy will remind you how cinema can still rise to the occasion and go beyond the empty bangs and flashes of tent pole releases.
Wajda has achieved something truly memorable: the film reminds you that cinema can be the preserver of the truth's smallest details, when a run of excellent pictures can finally tell a story the world was waiting for.
Wajda employs a full range of sweeping shots and orchestral cues to ramp up the emotion, although he's often guilty of sacrificing the intimacy of character for the grander narrative of history.
With its mournful score, muted cinematography and restrained performances, this is a work of sober commemoration, though the climactic depiction of the mass killing is justifiably harrowing.
A touch hard to tell what's going on at times, the film comes into its own towards the end as it portrays with shocking candour the genocide that still reverberates in Eastern Europe to this day.
Katy? is a brilliant exposition of the evil in the Polish-Russian history, the Katy? Massacre; with impressions of hope, lies, and struggle for identity, honor, and pride. Elegant despite the content. Serious, packing a powerful emotional punch. History made timely, interesting, and relevant.
Appreciate it for the historical knowledge it offered (you can blame my knowledge if you're a know-it-all), but the fictionalization and dialogues weren't quite effective.
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