ida

These are stills from Pawel Pawlikowski's film "Ida." I saw this stunning film last night and have not been able to get the images, setting and characters out of my mind. Not that I really want to.

From the NYT review by David Denby: "We are so used to constant movement and compulsive cutting in American movies that the stillness of the great new Polish film 'Ida' comes as something of a shock. I can’t recall a movie that makes such expressive use of silence and portraiture."

Again, David Denby: "Clearing away clutter, Pawlikowski almost never moves the camera; many of the scenes are just long-lasting shots, fed by a single light source that often puts the faces in partial shadow (what we understand of these two women will always be limited). Sometimes the figures are positioned at the bottom of the frame, with enormous gray Polish skies above them, as if the entire burden of a cursed country weighed on its people."

These are only a few of the starkly haunting images that crushed me last night. Please go see the movie so you, too, can be moved and inspired by 80 minutes of gorgeous black and white photography on a movie screen. It's a sad, bleak tale - one that revisits one of the darkest moments in history and which raises difficult questions surrounding those who survived it.

You can read Denby's review here.