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PRODUCTION Poland

Kolski’s new magic realism

by 

Jan Jakub Kolski, the director of Jasminum and Pornography [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, is currently shooting his new film Afonia i Pszczoly (“Afonia and the Bees”).

Like all of Kolski’s films, Afonia i Pszczoly is a blend of realism and magic. The film centres on three characters and is set at a precise moment in history – 1953 – the year of Stalin’s death.

Afonia (Grazyna Blecka-Kolska), a beekeeper in her 40s, has a true passion: she is never without her cine-camera so she can film the world around her. Her husband (Mariusz Saternik), a former world-renowned athlete, is handicapped and confined to a wheelchair he made himself, along with many other mobile machines.

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The third character is a Russian man, a former Red Army officer, Olympic athlete and war hero. The ambiguous relationship between the three protagonists is fuelled by love, jealousy and passion.

The film is lensed by Krzysztof Ptak – the DoP who worked on Kolski’s previous films and also shot Stanislaw Mucha’s Hope, Piotr Trzaskalski’s Edi and My Nikifor [+see also:
film review
film profile
]
by Krzysztof and Joanna Krauze.

Afonia i Pszczoly is produced by Lambros Ziotas of Argomedia Production on a budget of 3.3m zloties (€900,000), including 2m (€520,000) in backing from the Polish Film Institute (PISF).

The film’s theatrical release is set for September.

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(Translated from French)

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