Review: Katyn (18) (From Richmond and Twickenham Times)

Review: Katyn (18)

5:19pm Tuesday 23rd June 2009 in

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Nominated for the 2008 Academy Award as Best Film In A Foreign Language, Andrzej Wajda’s harrowing war opus addresses a controversial chapter in Poland’s recent history.

In particular, he dramatises the murder of Polish army officers during the Second World War at the hands of the Russian secret police in the titular forest, and the subsequent cover-up, which placed the blame for the genocide on the invading German forces.

A sprawling storyline weaves together several different characters including captain’s wife Anna (Maja Ostaszewska), who remains in denial about her husband’s fate, clinging forlornly onto the hope that he will return unscathed from a Russian internment camp.

In stark contrast, Polish People’s Army lieutenant Jerzy (Andrzej Chyra), who escaped the massacre, struggles to adjust to life under the occupation of The Red Army.