A child of resistance fighters in Poland during the war, director Jerzy Skolimowski knows all about sublimating politics into art and allegory, writes DONALD CLARKE
AS HAS ALREADY been noted in these pages, 2011 is the year of the Irish co-production. Films such as As If I am Not There, Circus Fantasticus, Lapland Odysseyand Off the Beaten Trackhave seen Irish producers work with partners from Macedonia, Slovenia, Finland and Romania.
Arguably the most impressive of the batch is a peculiar, exciting thriller entitled Essential Killing. Nearly wordless, impressively disciplined, the pictures stars Vincent Gallo as some class of guerrilla – his motives and origins are obscure – who, after carrying out an assassination, is detained by equally shadowy security forces. He escapes and, pursued into snowy uplands, becomes increasingly animalistic.
The film’s director is Jerzy Skolimowski. Now 72, educated during a golden age for Polish film-makers, he has, following expulsion from his homeland in the 1960s, become a dab-hand at managing the international co-production.
“When I decided to make this film, I was looking for partners and I was seeing who could offer what,” he says in a low rumble. “I was looking for Norwegian partners – because they have the snow. And then I was looking for a good sound studio. Ardmore is one of the best in the world. I then had Irish partners in Element Films, who were very helpful. It worked very well indeed.”
Sharply dressed in a grey suit, his head an imposing grey block, Skolimowski is master of that very characteristic bone-dry Polish humour. Matters of great import are dismissed with a weary shrug. I imagine he strikes a daunting figure on set. Mind you, working with Vincent Gallo, a famously difficult man, you’d need to have a strong personality.
"He is an eccentric man. Very definitely," he says. "We know each other a long time. When I finished writing Essential Killing, I went to Cannes and spotted him walking in front of me. He walks in such a weird way. I thought, such a figure would be very good for my project. I gave him the script and, a few hours later, he phoned back and said 'I must do this part. I must!'"
Gosh. One is reminded of Dennis Hopper telling David Lynch that he was Frank Booth, the deranged antagonist of Blue Velvet. So, was Gallo difficult on set? "Not at first. I said to him at Cannes: 'We shoot in winter, so you had better start growing a beard.' He would phone and say:
‘I already have two inches.’ It was easy in the beginning, but, later, because he is a method actor, it got complicated. He had to make himself feel alienated. But I know about the method actors.”
In earlier interviews, Skolimowski has argued that – despite apparent references to "the war on terror" – he does not see Essential Killingas a political film. He goes on to explain that he had quite enough of political film-making in Poland. In 1967, he made a film called Hands Up! that was highly critical of the post-Stalinist regime. Such was the scandal that he was driven from the country.
“That film led to me having to live the gypsy life,” he continues. “When I thought of this film, I suddenly realised: ‘Oh no. Politics.’ But I realised I could get past that if I gave it a poetical feel. It’s really about what makes a man become animalistic.”
Polish artists of his generation, raised under German occupation, coming to adulthood under the communist regime, know a thing or two about sublimating political statements into metaphor and allegory. Born in Lódz (home to Poland’s highly prestigious film school), Jerzy saw both his parents enrol in the Partisan resistance. Raids on the home were commonplace.
“Yes I remember the war well,” he says. “I remember the Gestapo banging on the door in the middle of the night. Because both parents were members of the Polish resistance, there was a printing machine under my bed. If they’d found that, we would all have been killed. I was trained to be a charming baby. When the Gestapo entered, I would bounce on the bed and they would give me sweets.”
Jerzy’s father, originally an architect, was eventually captured and executed. His mother, despite a refusal to join the Communist Party, was appointed a cultural attaché after the war and, to Jerzy’s delight, found herself posted to a relatively undamaged Prague.
“Eventually they discovered she was the only member of the attaché corps who was not a member. She was essentially expelled.”
After leaving school, Skolimowski developed an interest in jazz and, after meeting up with Andrzej Wajda, the most distinguished director of his generation, began dabbling in the world of film. Eventually he made his way to Lódz Film School, where he became part of an unusually talented mob of creative originals. Such directors as Andrzej Munk, Janusz Morgenstern, Kazimierz Kutz and Roman Polanski were all near contemporaries.
Having already written a film for Wajda, Jerzy soon attracted the attention of the school's most gifted student. Roman Polanski, already celebrated for his short films, had a good idea for a feature. He imagined a group of people holidaying on a boat over a long summer. Skolimowski liked the notion, but felt that it needed to be more focused. The result was Knife in the Water, Polanski's first classic.
“The idea was Roman’s,” Skolimowski says. “It was originally supposed to take all summer. I thought it should be simplified. It should have fewer people and take place over 24 hours. We wrote it in three nights.”
The resulting thriller, finished in 1962, was nominated for an Oscar and is still regarded as one of the great debuts. Polanski was quickly elevated to the status of modern great.
Was his talent apparent on first meeting? “Oh he was strikingly intelligent,” Skolimowski says. “He was full of life. There was talking, joking and a lot of energy. I remember us quarrelling and he produced this award he’d won for a short film. ‘I am an established film-maker,’ he said. I produced my writers’ union card and shouted: ‘Well, I am an established writer.’”
Both men ended up becoming exiles. Polanski dallied in London then made his way to Hollywood. Following that misunderstanding over Hands Up!, Skolimowski embarked on that gypsy life he referred to earlier.
Many outsiders remain surprised that such artists were able to leave Poland. We think of the former Soviet Bloc countries as maintaining tightly closed borders.
“It wasn’t that easy to get out. But in my case, the country preferred to get rid of me so I would cause less trouble. They basically expelled me.”
It's been an interesting career. He has not had many genuine hits. But, over the years, working in Britain, France, Germany and the US, he delivered quite a few fascinating oddities – King, Queen, Knave, a Nabokov adaptation featuring David Niven for one – and a handful of bona fide cult classics. The greatly admired Deep End, made in 1970 with Jane Asher and Diana Dors, has come to be regarded as a biting comment on British post-war decline. The sordid bathhouse that provides the setting is a metaphor for England. Isn't it? Skolimowski laughs.
“It was not any kind of criticism of anything. I just got lucky. I somehow managed to get Jane Asher and Diana Dors, who was just amazing. The film somehow turned out to be great.”
Other acclaimed films such as The Shout, starring Alan Bates, and Moonlighting, featuring Jeremy Irons, followed, but, despite brief forays to Hollywood, Jerzy never managed to put down roots. For a fleeting moment, he felt that, like so many European directors, he could settle in Los Angeles, but realised that he was a bit too antisocial for the Hollywood whirl.
In recent years, Skolimowski, who is also a fine painter, has returned to Poland. How strange it must be, having lived through the war and the Soviet era, to experience the modern, energetic Poland.
“It’s a completely different country,” he says. “It’s a blooming capitalist state. I’ve bought a house deep in the forest. I’m not a social person. I don’t go to the film openings or social the parties. I don’t mix with people. But the life there is actually very comfortable.”
Fair enough. After that much galavanting, the man deserves a rest.
Essential Killingis out now on limited release
