DECALOGUE EIGHT {DEKALOG, OSIEM} {THOU SHALT NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS} {POLISH WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES} (TV)
Summary
One in this series of ten films, made for Polish television by writer/director Krzysztof Kieslowski, based on the Ten Commandments. This program is inspired by the Eighth Commandment: Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. In this drama, Zofia, an elderly but vital professor of ethics, receives a visitor from the U.S. -- Elizabeth Loranz, who works for an American institute which studies the fates of Jews rescued from the Holocaust, and the translator of most of Zofia's work into English. Elizabeth asks if she may sit in on Zofia's classes, and the older woman obliges. In class, the purpose of Elizabeth's visit comes to light: she outlines an ethical dilemma with a story, and thus reveals to Zofia that she was the little Jewish girl who, in 1943, was brought to Zofia's Warsaw apartment by her desperate guardian. Zofia and her late husband were to serve as godparents to the child in a secret baptism in order to place her in a Catholic home and rescue her from the death camps. As Elizabeth remembers vividly, Zofia turned her away, citing the Eighth Commandment. Zofia is stunned, and Elizabeth appears pained and unsatisfied with the results of this long-anticipated confrontation. Later that evening the two women meet in the empty school building and talk, beginning a journey which takes them back to the defining event in both of their lives. Zofia, a member of the Polish underground who later rescued many Jews, discloses the real reason she turned Elizabeth away that cold night in 1943; and a friendship blooms between these two women whose lives have been inextricably bound for forty years. This program is in Polish with English subtitles.
Cataloging of this program was made possible by The Hearst Corporation, 1998.
Details
- NETWORK: TVP 1 (Poland)
- DATE: November 30, 1987
- RUNNING TIME: 0:54:13
- COLOR/B&W: Color
- CATALOG ID: T:20490
- GENRE: Drama
- SUBJECT HEADING: Drama; Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) - Drama; Holocaust survivors - Drama; International Collection - Poland
- SERIES RUN: TVP 1 (Poland) - TV, 1988
- COMMERCIALS: N/A
CREDITS
- Ryszard Chutkowski … Production (Misc.), Produkcja
- Krzysztof Kieslowski … Director, Writer, Screenplay by
- Andrzej Jaroszewicz … Direction (Misc.), Director of Photography
- Krzysztof Piesiewicz … Writer, Screenplay by
- Edward Rothert … Subtitles by
- Zbigniew Preisner … Music by
- Orkiestry Filharmonii Lodzkiej … Symphony Orchestra
- Maria Koscialkowska … Cast, Zofia (the Professor)
- Teresa Marczewska … Cast, Elzbieta (Elizabeth Loranz)
- Artur Barcis … Cast
- Tadeusz Lomnicki … Cast
- Marian Opania … Cast
- Bronislaw Pawlik … Cast
- W. Asinski … Cast
- M. Kepinski … Cast
- J. Mond … Cast
- K. Rojek … Cast
- W. Sanejko … Cast
- E. Skibinska … Cast
- W. Starostecki … Cast
- J. Schejbal … Cast
- J. Strzemzalski … Cast
- H. Szczerkowska … Cast
- A. Zagorska … Cast