100 Years of Polish Cinema (1995)

The Polish doco for the BFI’s Century of Cinema distinguishes itself from all the others in the series by being the only one not to have any film critics, academics, directors, etc providing a commentary. Instead it takes the refreshing route of having ordinary people of all ages talking about what’s special to them about movies – so we get some old folks describing their first trip to the cinema when a lot of people didn’t even know what a film was, memories of what it was like to go to the movies as children, teenagers, and adults before, during, and after WWII, and especially the key scenes from films that have made lasting impressions upon them (not unexpectedly, Wajda’s KANAL strikes a nerve), which are shown in accompaniment, so that it becomes the interviewees who ultimately decide what’s shown in the doco. This kind of stuff is what the ‘100 Years of Cinema’ celebration is really about.