The documentary film directed by Józef Burniewicz that drew great attention even while production was still underway.
The attraction of Chłopcy z Zatorza (Zatorze Boys) is the story it tells – a story of people, famous figures of Olsztyn’s social and cultural life, who grew up in a district of ill-repute, with a reputation for poverty, scraps and hooliganism. The story of the main characters, now educated people, transports the viewer to the period of their early childhood and adolescence, when they were learning to be independent.
The Warsaw Film Festival’s Inspection Committee lauded the film, emphasizing its effective execution, camerawork and editing, as well as the use of contrasts in the narrative (with bird’s eye view shots and a closing song about … the old Zatorzanka mall !).
Barbara Hollender, a film critic, one of the three committee experts (along Włodzimierz Kowalewski and Sławomir Rogowski) who assessed the project, concluded after the screening that it represents “good documentary cinema, worthy of documentary film festivals”.
The premiere screening, hosted by Gustaw Marek Brzezin, the Marshal of the Warmia and Mazury Province, was held on 14th November 2019 in Olsztyn’s HELIOS cinema, with all the actors in attendance: Wojtek Borkowski, Tadeusz Burniewicz, Władysław Katarzyński, Wiesław Pancer, Mirosław Siedler, Tomasz Śrutkowski and Mieczysław Wieliczko, as well as the entire creative team and crew.
Fot. Józef Burniewicz, Jarosław Yaremchuk
