Chapter 3 The first part of personal background early short film (11 ~ 15)

Kieslowski's graduation film Z Miasta Lodzi (1969), also his first professional work, was co-produced by the Lodzi Film Academy and WFD (Warsaw National Film Studio of Documentary Films) .Lodz, which was once the industrial center of Poland in the 19th century, now only remains in ruins, and the local people are also depressed and lose their vitality.In "So Said Kieslowski", he described Roz with such sharp words as "people's sad faces, with only strong meaninglessness in their eyes". Rods has everything but no one working: women doing exercises to relax, men wandering aimlessly in the streets, workers complaining about lack of funding for their bands, female workers who are about to retire complaining that they still want to Worked but missed the opportunity.In the park, a group of singing lovers chanted softly.As he said in "Kieslowski Says," he felt compelled to present a truth that people don't usually see on screen: "Our descriptive tools have always been used as propaganda. "People outside of Poland simply cannot imagine what it means to live in a world without expression."

I Was a Soldier (Bylem Zolnierzem, 1970) is one of his strongest documentaries, not only because of its moving subject — soldiers who went blind in World War II — but also because of the film’s restrained approach.At first, we don't know how these people are connected, and everyone's narration is shot in close-up.The only hints are: some of them are wearing black sunglasses, and some of them say the word "see" in the past tense.Then a headline appeared on the white screen: "I asked the doctor: 'What time is it?'" They calmly expressed a similar desperation, with one saying: "Now I'm blind, why am I alive? Another said: "I would rather disappear from the earth." Then, the picture faded again, the title appeared, and the soldiers' colorful dreams were introduced, and a veteran said: "In the dream I can see everything." The third A headline appeared, "It's All To Blame the War," followed by their discourse about antiwar and hope for peace.

Every time the screen whitens and the title appears, there will be classical harp music, which fits perfectly with the narrative techniques Kieslowski uses in this film.The counterpoint music works closely with the different faces and voices that are edited together.At the same time, "I Was a Soldier" still has a faint sense of self-awareness: the veterans seem to be sitting around a round table, but there is always an obstacle to our sight-a leaf or a branch-not much or not Little, just enough for the audience to realize that even we can't see everything.The director did not use long shots, or even subjective shots, in order to prevent others from drawing conclusions easily. (There is a curious symmetry in Kieslowski's work: if Seven Women of Different Ages, made eight years later, was about women in the dance world, eight years earlier I Once a Soldier" presents seven men of different ages in the context of war.)

"Factory" (Fabryka, 1970) and "Before the Rally" (Przed Rajdem, 1971), whether it is the tractor factory lacking equipment due to bureaucracy in the former, or the two in the latter due to the problem of Polish-made Fiat sports cars The many drivers who were unable to participate in the Monte Carlo Rally were all about Poland's economic woes.The former once again used editing to establish the overall structure of the film. He edited the industrial workers in the Ursus tractor factory with the scenes of the long-winded and clichéd board meeting. "Before Rally" effectively counterpoints the picture and music, and the classical music of the harp contrasts with the chaotic scene.

Refrain (Refren, 1972) was a refinement of the dark humor already found in his debut novel, The Office: bureaucracy is everywhere, even in funeral homes.One customer was told that if he didn't die on the street, he couldn't be buried in the cemetery he asked for.Another customer learned that you can't get a cemetery without a death certificate.The last shot of the whole film is also the most Kieslowski-esque shot: people hang numbers on newborn babies.If it is said that death has become a kind of work that can be done step by step, the ending shot ironically implies that bureaucracy actually begins at birth. Refrain is in step with the 1971 Polish Filmmakers Manifesto, which Kieslowski co-signed, which called for more documentaries to castigate bureaucracy, corruption and hypocrisy.

However, the two documentaries commissioned by Kieslowski at the Rubin Copper Mine - Miedzy Wroclawlem a Zielona Gora (Miedzy Wroclawlem a Zielona Gora, 1972), Copper Mine Safety and Health A far more optimistic attitude can be found in the Code of Conduct (Podstawy BHP w Kopalni Miedzi, 1972).The former is narrated by a young male worker who arrived in the new town between Locklow and Chironagra seven months ago.The men raved not only about their working environment but also about the Rubin copper mine itself, where they built apartment complexes that “sprung up like mushrooms after rain.”New buildings, schools, shops, theaters and sports fields appear in the picture, providing evidence for his narration of "a city that is waking up and full of life." "Copper Mine Safety and Health Code" is a short film dedicated to worker training, and this is the only one of all Kieslowski's documentaries that uses a third-person omniscient perspective for narration.The focus of the film is still on the worker in "Between Locklow and Chironagra", who introduced the audience to how to work in the mine.But the funniest parts about what not to do—such as jumping off a moving underground train—many of them are shown in the form of cartoons.

Returning to a more personal and darker tone, Robotnicy '71 (1972), co-directed with Tomasz Zygadlo, is a 46-minute Subtitled "Nothing about us without us", the documentary reflects the current situation in Poland after the end of the strike movement in December 1970.The film adopts the so-called "fly on the wall" shooting method, and uses the lens to record the disappointment of the Polish people. A widow whose symphony orchestra played for her husband's funeral, and voters at the party's electoral convention.As in "Before Rally," classical music—this time on guitars—again serves as counterpoint, creating an orderly atmosphere that contrasts sharply with the disaffected populace in the picture.

At a Paris seminar in 1997, Kieslowski's colleague, the brilliant documentary filmmaker Marcel Lozinski, recalled the general environment in which they made these films: After the anti-Semitic and anti-intellectual campaigns of 1968, we felt a little hope in the early 1970s with the arrival of Galek.Although the best teachers in the film school - most of whom are Jewish - have had to leave, there is still complete freedom in the school.The situation at this point was ridiculous, and almost all of the film we made was shelved.However, Kieslowski cleverly explained to the Deputy Minister of Culture that since 90% of the films made every year are political propaganda films, if a few films can be made every year from the perspective of the opposition party, it may be of great interest in the future. He is useful in person - if a new power comes to power.His persuasion worked.

Bricklayer (Murarz, 1973) juxtaposes public action with private action, juxtaposing the officially organized May Day parade with a voice-over of a man filled with disbelief and disappointment.The film thus has two focal points, which are embodied in a moving shot: 45-year-old Josef Malesa sits in a bus, the camera follows him from outside the window, and he merges with the Warsaw street scene reflected in the window .As he and his friends prepare to join the march, an account of his life offers a brief summary of his entire life — from youthful activist (“We all thought we were creating a revolution”) to his own ascent to bureaucracy Part of the system, and then disillusioned in 1956, and finally returned to the old profession of masons.In the parade, the slogans came and went, but Kieslowski focused on this peaceful voice.The film ends with an overhead shot of the streets of Warsaw, while Malesa proudly talks about his work as a mason.The mud-brick houses lined up along the street also serve as evidence to support his concluding words: seeing the houses he built so strong, he feels that this life has not been in vain.

Later, in The Railway Station (Dworzec, 1980), Kieslowski juxtaposed the optimism of official propaganda more poignantly with the despondency of the individual.He spent a total of ten nights filming at Warsaw Central Station. At the beginning of the film, there was a TV news announcer's announcement of the rising value of industrial and agricultural output, but what appeared on the screen were sad scenes in the waiting room. face.The announcer's voice is then moderately lowered and replaced by a female voice announcing the delay of the train - indeed a common occurrence in Poland at the time. "Why are so many trains being cancelled?" a man asked. "Because there are fewer passengers." That's the answer he gets, and the audience can only speculate doubtfully whether the opposite is true.A late train finally arrived, some passengers rushed over, and the rest could only continue to sit in this gloomy station.

Based on these alone, we are enough to regard "The Railway Station" as an excellent documentary that faithfully reflects the reality of Poland, but what is even more amazing is that towards the end of the film, Kieslowski also used the camera probe inside the station. The rotating footage, the camera rolling five times before, and the soundtrack's timpani create an ominous feel.When the cameras came on for the seventh and eighth time, there was no more drumming, and the scene switched back and forth between the surveillance equipment and the people watching the TV in the station. (They were watching closed-circuit television at the station, and the announcer announced that "an English film, My Friend Spotter," was about to be shown.) At the end of "The Station," the man behind the camera finally emerges : Manipulating buttons one by one with indifference, staring at screens one by one, even the whole train station.Unlike a TV newscaster, he was invisible to others, yet, like the broadcaster, he was out of place with the audience waiting for the bus. In X-Ray (Przeswietlenie, 1974) there is an even more hopeless waiting, the tuberculosis sanatorium.Four patients described feelings of sadness, self-doubt, and feelings of worthlessness.Similar to "I Was a Soldier", all four of them also appear in close-up shots.They lamented that they could no longer be a complete person like a normal person in a nursing home.Kieslowski may have been drawn to the theme because his father also died of tuberculosis, but more notably the theme of "X-Ray," a theme that would be fully developed years later in "Three Colors." Theme: the plight of isolated individuals. As he said in an interview with a French journalist in 1979: "When I make a feature film, I always know how it will end. But when I make a documentary, I don't know. I just don't know how the next shot will end, that's all." That's enough to get people excited, not to mention that the whole movie's ending is unknown. For me, documentaries are a greater art form than dramas, because I think life is smarter than me. It creates something more interesting than I could ever have come up with."10 This is also demonstrated in (Pierwsza Milosc, 1974), and at the same time, it is a climax of Kieslowski's film career. turning point. Aside from the title itself, it's hard to call it a romance film, as we don't see any images of lust, courtship or lust, all we see is a pregnant 17 year old girl and her boyfriend The real process of how to officially become a couple.Yadwija ​​first met in the doctor's office, who warned her that abortion was dangerous.The first time Roman was seen was during his medical examination for military service.If, for the title of the film, the audience originally expected to see kisses and dates, what Kieslowski brought us was the reality of life full of bureaucracy and constant compromise. In the office of the Housing Administration, boys and girls hope that the other party can speed up the work and arrange an apartment for them, but the female clerk tells them that they have to wait for three years.They had to live in a spare cottage at Jadwiga's grandmother's house.While painting the hut, the police came again, saying that their household registration had not been registered at this address, and then he sarcastically said that this apartment, which was originally just a kitchen, was too crowded for three people to live in. (Kieslowski admits that he managed to "hire" the cop "for the purpose of provoking," "I got the cop on purpose, but Jadwiga was eight months old at the time. Pregnant, I might have risked it a little bit—a surprise police visit might have caused a premature birth, but I don’t think it’s too much of a problem.”)[11] The wedding was not glamorous at all, registration fees had to be paid, and the surrounding noise overshadowed the wedding.The bride cried tearfully, and her parents told her they hoped her marriage would be better than theirs.The director replaces the romantic warmth of Hollywood movies (or romance movies, which are common on European screens) with the realistic pressures that Polish young people have to face.In the park, for example, Jadwija ​​was asked casually by a young mother if she was worried that her child might be born with a disability.When she went back to school to get her grade book, she also had to face the teacher's censure: As a female teacher said, her conduct score was only C, which not only reflected her frequent absence, but also verified that she was pregnant and became a mother at the age of 17. A negative teaching material.