Film Archive

The Red Spider

Official Selection - Competition 2015 / Czerwony pająk / Poland, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic 2015

This feature debut by a leading Polish documentarist and cameraman was inspired by actual mass murders committed in the 1960s. A precisely constructed psychological thriller, the film delves into an intricate story of the fascination with evil that hides in places we would never expect.

Synopsis

Kraków, 1967. Karol’s parents would like their son to train as a doctor but, for the time being, he spends his time practising his diving and observes everything going on around him with a stony expression. In a life devoid of positive emotions his attention focuses on the trail of a mass murderer who has already hammered to death more than ten people. While the city is gripped with fear, Karol is ready to get out there and stand in his way. Seclusive in his behaviour, the young man doesn’t get enough excitement from adrenaline sports, and the risk he is taking appears to be the only way he can truly feel alive. The film clearly points to Marcin Koszałka’s training as a cameraman; and he constructs the work with the precision of a sculptor, at the same time employing this quality to expose the story’s rotten core. Kraków is here depicted as an inhospitable place, while the mise en scène underscores the emptiness of the protagonists’ lives. Moreover, the film’s overall remoteness gives rise to a heightened sense of the unsettling perverseness of what is actually happening on screen.

Viktor Palák

About the film

90 min / Color, DCP
World premiere
Director Marcin Koszałka / Screenplay Marcin Koszałka, Łukasz M. Maciejewski podle originálního příběhu / based on the orignal script by Marta Szreder / Dir. of Photography Marcin Koszałka / Music Petr Ostrouchov / Editor Krzysztof Komander / Art Director Ryszard Melliwa, Magdalena Dipont / Producer Agnieszka Kurzydło / Production MD4 / Coproduction Fog'n'Desire Films, spol. s.r.o., SokolKollar, spol. s.r.o., Orange Poland, Krakow Festival Office, Krakow Film Commission, Zentropa International Poland, Kino Świat / Cast Filip Pławiak, Adam Woronowicz, Julia Kijowska, Małgorzata Foremniak / Contact MD4 / Distributor A-Company Czech s.r.o.

About the director

Marcin Koszałka (b. 1970, Kraków) studied sociology, cinematography and production at the University of Silesia in Katowice (2001). He worked as cameraman on several features (e.g. Scratch / Rysa, Till It Hurts / Do Bolu – KVIFF 2009). Filmography as director: Such a Beautiful Son I Delivered (Takiego pięknego syna urodziłam, 1999), Name Day (Imieniny, 2004), It’ll Work Out Somehow (Jakoś to będzie, 2001), All Day Together (Cały dzień razem, 2006), Death with a Human Face (Śmierć z ludską twarzą, 2007), Existence (Istnienie, 2007), Declaration of Immortality (Deklaracja niesmiertelnosci – Best Short Documentary Award at KVIFF 2010). The documentaries were awarded at many festivals. The Red Spider is his first film to be entered for the main competition at Karlovy Vary.