Kanał (film)

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Kanał

Directed by	Andrzej Wajda
Produced by	Zespół Filmowy Kadr
Written by	Jerzy Stefan Stawiński
Starring	Teresa Izewska Tadeusz Janczar Wienczysław Gliński Tadeusz Gwiazdowski Stanisław Mikulski Emil Karewicz Vladek Sheybal Teresa Berezowska
Distributed by	Zespół Filmowy Kadr
Release date(s)	1956
Running time	95 min
Language	Polish
IMDb profile

Kanał is a Polish film released in 1956, directed by Andrzej Wajda for P.P. Film Polski at its production unit, Zespol Filmowy "Kadr".

“Watch them closely, for these are the last hours of their lives,” announces the disembodied voice of a narrator, foreshadowing the tragedy that unravels as Wajda guides us through a claustrophobic tale of a ravaged company of Home Army resistance fighters escaping the Nazi onslaught through the city’s sewers. Kanał is the second film of Wajda's War trilogy, which includes the earlier A Generation and the later Ashes and Diamonds.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

It is September, 1944, the last days of the Warsaw Uprising, and Lieutenant Zadra (Wienczyslaw Glinski) is commanding a platoon of 43 soldiers in a desperate battle amidst the ruins of the Mokotów district. Facing a German offense and cut off from their comrades, Zadra is ordered to retreat through the sewers ('kanał' is the Polish word for sewer) to the downtown district. Reluctant to admit defeat but determined to survive, the men and women of the platoon slog through the hellish labyrinth, only to become separated. The lovers Daisy (Teresa Izewska) and Corporal Korab (Tadeusz Janczar) wade through sewage and support each other to the bitter end.

An original promotional poster

Kanał was the first film made about the Warsaw Uprising, earning Wajda the Special Jury Prize (the second most prestigious after the Palme d'Or) at Cannes in 1957 and solidifying his position as Poland's premier director. Censorship remained strong in Poland, but the fall of the Stalinist regime of Bolesław Bierut following the death of Joseph Stalin led to a losing of control allowing the film, "showing the tragic fate of those who followed the wrong orders," as the press put it at the time, to be made. Polish critics state that the film paved the way for other films of the Polish School of filmmakers. The script was written by Jerzy Stefan Stawiński who himself survived in the sewers as a soldier of Armia Krajowa (the Polish underground resistance army) during the Warsaw Uprising.