Have You Seen It?

Country of Origin: Poland. Produced by Warsaw Documentary Film Studio. Directed by Krzysztof Kieslowski in cooperation with Krzysztof Wierzbicki. Broadcast on Polish television in 1980. Running time: 13 minutes.

Krzysztof Kieslowski’s Railway Station is a documentary short film with a mood of normalized foreboding. It is a memorable glimpse into communist Poland in 1980.

At the beginning of the film, there is a televised newscast that announces that the government has decided to increase food production by 15 to 20 per cent. It gives an indication of a tight government-mandated controI. The newscast mentions varied economic accomplishments of the state and takes pride that they have 1,100,000 educated specialists.

Meanwhile, as a puzzling contrast to what was being televised, a man at the train station asks a train representative why they are cancelling so many trains. The representative tells him, “Officially, it is because we have no passengers.” It conveys the depressed sense of a failing economy.

At the station, there are various scenarios the railway passengers have to contend with (a dispute with railway policy, prices, etc.) . The negative influence of authority, especially governmental, on everyday life is a frequent theme of Kieslowski’s.

Three minutes into the film there is the first appearance of an ominous video camera moving slowly side to side, and up then down. Everything, even the most mundane of activities, is being observed. This motif of the video camera coupled with the darkly atmospheric score by Michal Zarnecki creates the most haunting image in the film and contributes to a sense of underlying menace.

With its observant black and white imagery and its spare and resonating score, Railway Station is a film that fascinates even though nothing overtly dramatic happens. It is in the foreboding mood that underlies it that the movie achieves its effect.

Railway Station can be viewed as a portrait of a particular place in another country at a specific time in history. As that, it certainly succeeds. It can also be viewed as a look at the harsh contrast between a government’s optimistic economic propaganda and the grit and thorns reality of the everyday person. From that perspective, what initially seemed fascinatingly foreign and removed by forty-five years transforms into a movie that is disconcertingly domestic and relevant to today.

(A print of Railway Station/Dworzec is currently available on YouTube.)