Filmmaker Roman Polanski revisits the “horror” of his childhood during the Holocaust in a new documentary released in his hometown, Krakow. The directors, Mateusz Kudla and Anna Kokoszka-Romer, hope that the documentary can be made available online or on streaming platforms.
The film follows Polanski as he tours the city with photographer Ryszard Horowits, an old friend of his and a Holocaust survivor whom he met in the Jewish ghetto during the war. The documentary is about “memory, confrontations with the past, transience, trauma, destiny,” said Mateusz Kudla, who directed and produced the film together with Anna Kokoszka-Romer.
“Through these two characters who were lucky, who survived, we also want to show the tragedy of all the residents of the Krakow ghetto who did not succeed,” Kudla told Afp Agency.
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In a scene from “Polanski, Horowitz. Hometown, ”which kicked off this year’s Krakow Film Festival, Polanski recalls seeing a German Nazi officer shooting an old woman in the back, blood gushing out like a fountain. “Terrified, I ran through the door behind me … I hid behind those stairs,” says Polanski, who was six years old when World War II broke out. “It was my first encounter with horror,” he explains to Horowitz, who is watching him closely.
Horowitz, who was one of those who received help from the German industrialist Oskar Schindler, rolls up his sleeves in another scene to show the number tattooed on his forearm when he arrived, at the age of five, at the Auschwitz death camp.
“Sometimes I stare into space and think it can’t be true, that it must be a stupid joke. Is it possible that he was there and survived? ”Says Horowitz.
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The film also captures the moment in which Polanski, visibly moved, meets with the grandson of Stefania and Jan Buchala, the Polish Catholic peasant couple who hid him from the Nazis.
The film makes no reference to the sexual assault allegations against Polanski, who was declared persona non grata in Hollywood and cannot return to the United States because of an arrest warrant.
“That was not our focus, it was not our intention to defend or accuse anyone. This film is about another chapter in the life of Roman Polanski ”, Kokoszka-Romer explained to Afp.
The directors hope that the documentary can be made available online or on streaming platforms.
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