Lech Walesa was the unstoppable driving force behind Poland’s peaceful revolution. At 87 years old, the renowned Polish auteur Andrzej Wajda appears equally unstoppable. No-one seems better qualified to tackle this subject than him.
His films have long been chronicling Poland’s history, and he bore witness to the events of the film as they occurred. In fact, Wajda’s Man Of Iron (1981) even featured Walesa in a minor part, playing himself.
Confrontational, charismatic, and committed to peace, Walesa (played this time by Robert Więckiewicz) is the shipyard-worker-turned-hero of Poland’s uprising against the Soviet-controlled state. It marked the first in a series of revolutions across Eastern Europe, leading to the fall of the Iron Curtain.
Man Of Hope is set through the guise of Oriana Fallaci’s 1981 interview with the leader. Through Fallaci’s prompting, Walesa recounts his unplanned rise to fame. Beginning with a small-scale strike in a Gdansk shipyard, he quickly moves on to the role of leader of the Solidarity movement, and eventually wins the Nobel Peace Prize for his work.
Więckiewicz’s striking performance brings Walesa to life, and his uncanny likeness means that interspersed archival footage flows easily into the plotline. There is also an effective balance held between Walesa’s public and private life. The strength of his wife Danuta (Agnieszka Grochowska) through the turmoil does not go unnoticed in the film, even if it does by Walesa at the time.
With such a complex subject there is potential to get lost in the details, but the film keeps an energising pace as events play out. It’s all helped along by a great soundtrack, which draws on popular Polish music, from punk to reggae. It is noteworthy, however, that the film’s timeline ends in 1981, rather than following Walesa further into his controversial term of president. This leaves the film imbued with a message of hope and success.
3/5 stars
Walesa. Man Of Hope opens in cinemas Thursday July 10.
