In what would be Andrzej Wajda’s final film (and rarely seen in the UK), this is the story of charismatic painter Wladyslaw Strzeminski, who opposed social realism and maintained his own artistic freedom in spite of political obstacles.
Polish avant-garde artist Strzeminski (Boguslaw Linda in a magisterial performance) lost a leg and arm fighting in World War I, and yet his passion for the transformative powers of art makes him whole. His injuries are merely a nuisance to be endured. He is a revered figure in the Polish art community, with a classroom packed with adoring students, but his painterly abstractions are toxic to the Communist authorities, who castigate as capitalist decadence all art that is not uplifting social realism. ‘Afterimage’ is angry, vivid and passionate – a fitting coda to the career of a director whose own work often clashed with Communist ideology. (Subtitles)
Poland 2016 Andrzej Wajda 98m
