Slideshow
ASHES AND DIAMONDS
Thursday, October 22
5:50
U.S. PREMIERE OF NEW 4K RESTORATION
All shows preceded by recorded introductions by Martin Scorsese and Krystyna Zachwatowicz-Wajda, filmed especially for this retrospective.
Popiół i diament
Poland, 1958
Directed by Andrzej Wajda
Starring Zbigniew Cybulski, Ewa Krzyżewska, Wacław Zastrzeżyński
Approx. 103 mins. 4K restoration/35mm.
In the spring of 1945, weary and disillusioned by the war against the Nazis that has just ended, uncertain about a future under Communist rule, two resistance fighters are under orders to assassinate the incoming district leader. One of the fighters, the brooding Maciek, played by Zbigniew Cybulski (often called “the Polish James Dean”), falls in love with a local barmaid, and is suddenly torn about how to move forward. As Wajda said about ASHES AND DIAMONDS, almost universally regarded as his masterpiece, “I have tried to reveal to movie audiences the complicated and difficult world of a generation to which I myself belong.” This anguished, romantic, and deeply personal film is an all-time favorite of both Francis Ford Coppola and Martin Scorsese, who placed it as #3 on his top ten list for Sight and Sound.
Presented with support from The Ashes and Diamonds Fund for Eastern European Film and The Ada Katz Fund for Literature in Film
Reviews
“I saw ASHES AND DIAMONDS for the first time in 1961. And even back then, during that period when we expected to be astonished at the movies, when things were happening all over the world, it shocked me. It had to do with the look, both immediate and haunted, like a nightmare that won’t stop unfolding; the sense of maddening insanity and absurdity, the tragedy of political infighting on the brink of peace and coming of age during wartime; and the beauty of the lead actor, Zbigniew Cybulski.”
– Martin Scorsese
“Fabulous. It’s a beautiful movie. It was an extraordinary movie for many reasons. It’s less known than it should be, but it’s a beauty.”
– Francis Ford Coppola
“Hauntingly fascinating, brilliantly conceived, and haunting. Packs a great deal of cinematic and just plain raw graphic power.”
– Bosley Crowther, The New York Times
“Wajda’s style is in part naturalistic, in part symbolic. He handles scenes of violence with a furious exactitude and moments of tenderness with a delicacy that never lunges into sentimental excess.”
– Herald Tribune