16 March 2018

Barwy ochronne / Camouflage (by Krzysztof Zanussi)



The loose threads of narrative keep circling back to a through-line in the form of an ongoing debate between a young graduate lecturer, Jaroslaw (Piotr Garlicki) and an older, jaded professor, Jakub (Zbigniew Zapasiewicz) who are running a linguistics summer camp. Through their verbal sparring, Jakub is ostensibly attempting to convince Jaroslaw that his world-view, which largely boils down to youthful honesty, is not only naive but an ineffective way to navigate the politics of academia – and by extension the wider dynamics of the latter years of the Communist state. Of course, though, there are many more layers shifting beneath the surface in this densely textured treatise that both expounds and belittles its protagonists conflicting beliefs with equal gusto. ~Ben Nicholson