AN ORDINARY COUNTRY

ZWYCZAJNY KRAJ

Controlled conversations, recording with hidden cameras, dirty records of interrogations and recruitment attempts as well as video tutorials for the officers of the security service – all of these materials are employed to portray the monitored life in Poland under communism. Sometimes grotesque, this picture is underpinned by horror, escalating intuitively with every minute. The dramatic culmination is when the Big Brother is not just watching but violating the intimacy of an ordinary citizen. Before us, there is a terrifying communist panopticon which keeps spying on and recording itself.

  • Genre: Documentary
  • Country: Poland
  • Running time: 51
  • Year: 2020
  • Color: Black & White

Director: Tomasz Wolski

Script: Tomasz Wolski

Editing: Tomasz Wolski

Production company: KIJORA / Anna Gawlita

Trailer

About the director:

Tomasz Wolski

Tomasz Wolski

Tomasz Wolski – a member of Guild of Polish Documentary Directors, Polish Film Academy and European Film Academy. Director of short film “Daughter” (Grand Prix at Angers Premiers Plan) & director, editor, cameramen of 13 documentaries awarded at many international festivals incl. Los Angeles Film Festival, Palm Springs Film Festival, Punto de Vista, Nancy – Aye Aye Film Festival, Evora – FIKE, Flickerfest International Short Film Festival, Camerimage & Kraków Film Festival.

At festivals:

51st Visions du Réel International Film Festival Nyon, Switzerland , 2020 (Jury Prize Clinique de Genolier)

60th Krakow Film Festival, 2020, Poland, 2020 (Golden Hobby-Horse)

8th FIDBA Buenos Aires International Documentary Film Festival, Argentina, 2020 (Special Mention)

Festival Internacional de Cine Independiente de La Plata Festi-Freak, Argentina, 2020 (competition)

30th Film Festival Cottbus, Germany, 2020 (screening)

27th Minsk International Film Festival 'Listapad', Belarus, 2020 (Special Jury Award)

IDFA, The Netherlands, 2020 (screening)

FIPADOC, France , 2021 (competition)

32nd Trieste Film Festival, Italy, 2021 (screening)

XIV International Documentary Film Festival MiradasDoc, Tenerife, 2021 (competition)

ZagrebDox - International Documentary Film Festival, 2021, Croatia, 2021 (competition)

42nd Durban International Film Festival, South Africa, 2021 (competition)

11th Atlantida Film Festival, Mallorca, Spain, 2021 (screening)

18th IndieLisboa IFF, Portugal, 2021 (competition)

14th Beldocs International Documentary Film Festival, Serbia, 2021 (screening)

16th Cinematik Film Festival, Slovakia, 2021 (screening)

18th Neisse Film Festival, Germany, 2021 (competition)

11th Festival of Freedom, Slovakia, 2021 (screening)

Videogrames 2021, Lithuania, 2021 (screening)