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29-01-2008

Competition launched for new Solidarity film

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    The European Solidarity Centre and the Polish Film Institute have launched an open competition for a script about the Solidarity movement and its international impact. The prize for the winning script on the theme "Solidarity: The First Hole in the Wall" is 50,000 zloties (€13,800)

    The deadline for submission of works to PFI (www.pisf.pl) is June 30. The winner will be announced during the 28th anniversary of the signing of the accords that made Solidarity the first legitimate free trade union in Eastern Europe on Aug. 31, 1980.

    The entries should be scripts for a feature film for movie theaters. The plot should focus on the role and position of Solidarity in the push for freedom and democracy in Central and Eastern Europe. It should show the complexity of the largest Polish success in modern history and the international impact of the movement.

    In announcing the competition at a briefing Jan. 28, PFI Director Agnieszka Odorowicz noted that for the first time, the jury comprises only filmmakers. The six-person jury is made up of Mirosław Chojecki, Jan Dworak, Maciej Grzywaczewski, Agnieszka Holland, Jerzy Stuhr and Krzysztof Zanussi.

    Barbara Holland said such a project is very much needed.

    "I am of the opinion there is a certain gap in Polish cinema because it does not show events from the recent history of Poland," she said at the briefing, noting the last film about Solidarity was Andrzej Wajda's Man of Iron from 1981.