United States of Love [Zjednoczone stany milosci] **** (2016, Julia Kijowska, Magdalena Cielecka, Dorota Kolak, Marta Nieradkiewicz) – Movie Review

The 36-year-old Polish writer-director Tomasz Wasilewski (Floating Skyscrapers) delivers a devastating punch to the gut in this amazingly accomplished and desperately disturbing drama set in Poland in 1990, the first year of the country’s freedom.

Wasilewski won the Silver Berlin Bear for Best Script at the Berlin International Film Festival 2016. A bigger prize would be better, but this will have to do for now. It won five awards at the Polish Film Festival 2016 but not the Golden Lion for Best Film.

In difficult circumstances, Julia Kijowska, Magdalena Cielecka, Dorota Kolak and Marta Nieradkiewicz give the most superlative performances as four small-town women of different ages who decide that it is time to change their lives, with shocking results. Kolak is especially moving as the older woman Renata, a bewildered teacher casually pensioned off before her time and chucked onto life’s scrapheap.

But this intertwining four-story saga isn’t a women-only film, for the actresses get the strongest possible support by the actors. Tomasz Tyndyk, Andrzej Chyra, Marcin Czarnik and Lukasz Simlat give their all, too. It is an hour and three quarters but it feels epic.

The engage-brain and engage-everything film pushes very hard and is extremely full on, leaving the audience devastated and emotionally exhausted afterwards. You’ll need to head off for a fun, feel-good movie immediately. Fantastic Beasts, anyone?

© Derek Winnert 2016 Movie Review

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Tomasz Wasilewski (born September 26, 1980).