The only feature film of Erwin Axer, an outstanding theatrical director.
Adaptation of an unfinished play of Emil Zegadłowicz, written during the first two years of Hitler’s occupation and emanating a sense of defeat.
A propaganda picture showing how People’s Poland perceived the interwar period, the rule of the Sanation political movement and the September defeat.
The film combines dramatic historic events with an almost satirical criticism of the society and the political system of the Second Polish Republic.
The end of August, 1939. One of the leftist newspapers publishes the text “Domek z kart” (“A card house”) whose author Bruno Sztorc criticizes the Polish government and the false conviction about the country’s power. The article causes a sensation and awakes an immense interest, also among the Sanation government which orders to confiscate the entire circulation. Sztorc himself is arrested virtually on the eve of the outbreak of World War II. On 17th September the journalist, who’s still a political prisoner, witnesses the escape of the top government officials to Romania. He’s freed by the soldiers of the Red Army who enter Poland.
In the formal sense “Domek z kart” combines a film and a spectacle. Axel transferred onto the screen his own plays presented in Teatr Współczesny (Contemporary Theater) in Warsaw that were very well received by the communist government and critics. The actors who played in the spectacle “Domek z kart” played their roles again in the film version.
Excerpt from the movie
