Award-winning filmmaker and his world-famous photographer friend return to Poland to wander around the cobbled streets of beautiful Cracow, recalling happy childhood memories as well as the tragic wartime experiences. The film is a colourful tale about growing up in a worn torn country, decades long friendship, the same Jewish fate and, above all, the place that despite the passage of time and many changes continues to remain their home.
After several decades, they finally meet in their hometown. World-famous photographer Ryszard Horowitz and award-winning, and highly controversial, film director Roman Polanski. Two artists, who first met as children in the Jewish ghetto established by the Germans in the occupied Poland, return to Cracow to wander along the pathways of their wartime experiences. They tell the story of survival – how Horowitz became one of the youngest kids rescued by Oscar Schindler and how Polanski after escaping the ghetto hid in the house of a poor peasant family – and a story of a long time friendship going back to the times when they skipped school to go to the movies, developed their first photographs and fell in love with art.
"Co-directors Mateusz Kudla and Anna Kokoszka-Romer have crafted a gently perceptive film that subtly examines the different characteristics of two very different men, allowing space and time for introspection alongside gentle humour, all the time balancing memory with perspective.
Roman Polanski is, of course, a polarising figure, but this film is a compassionate exploration of a very specific time in history and these two thoughtful men offer a personal and emotional take on being a Jewish child during World War II in Poland" — Mark Adams, Business Doc Europe
WINNER: Audience Award I Krakow Film Festival I 2021
WINNER: National Competition Special Mention I Krakow Film Festival I 2021
WINNER: Audience Award I Two Riversides Film and Art Festival l I 2021
WINNER: Krzysztof Kieslowski Main Award "Beyond Borders" I The New York Polish Film Festival I 2022
NOMINATED: Discovery of Year I Polish Film Awards I 2022
NOMINATED: Best Documentary I Polish Film Awards I 2022
E
85 min
Roman Polanski, Ryszard Horowitz, Bronislawa Horowitz-Karakulska
Mateusz Kudla, Anna Kokoszka-Romer