Mis

Apparently quite beloved in its native Poland, this is a very amusing, sometimes over the top satire of life under the bureaucracy of communism.

The president of a soccer club tries to hold things together when his wife destroys his passport just before he has to leave a trip to play in the UK, so she can beat him there and steal some money they stashed away.

Everyone is playing and coning everyone else, with sometimes unpredictable results.

Not a great film, but a breezy enjoyable one.

Like most Polish movies of the Communist era, "Teddy Bear" has several layers of meaning. On the surface it's a comedy of absurdities. But the absurdities make perfect sense in the political context of Poland of the 1970th. The movie shows Communism is its final stages of decay. The system becomes a game with complex and absurd rules. Only people who master these rules can be successful. The film's hero is one of them.

The key to understanding the movie is the dialog between the hero and a film producer about a straw bear--a giant prop for the movie they are making. The producer uses common sense to try to minimize the movie's production costs. The hero explains to him how rational arguments don't apply in the system they are living in. The simpleton film producer is initiated in the ways of the system.

There is a progression from George Orwell's stern an tragic "1984", through Terry Gilliam's tragicomic "Brazil", to the comically absurd "Teddy Bear"--a progression which reflects the various stages and versions of Communism. The Polish version is the most benign and tongue-in-cheek and the film describes it perfectly.

This is a must-see movie, only of its kind! Every scene is EXTREMELY comic! However, non-Polish people may have problems with understanding it. You cannot fully understand it, if you have seen it only once. Second time is better! And third! And fourth! Etc... I have seen this movie 20 times, or maybe more. And every time I was joking! And every time it was even better... :-) Some of the scenes seem to be completely nonsense, but in fact they are all based on real life in Poland in 1980's. And that's why it is yet more funny! There are a lot of jokes and gags, which seem to be absurd, but they are real-life jokes! You know - it's something like Monty Python in reality. :-)

Smart, absurd, outrageously funny, brilliantly acting, shockingly critical, and, at least for (and perhaps other) Polish audiences that grew up under socialism, tragic and moving. Unfortunately, much of its brilliance is lost in translation, and it may not make sense for viewers who are unfamiliar with Eastern European history after the Second World War. The general plot is as defined by other reviewers; it serves as a platform for a life tour under Soviet-imposed communism, covering various social strata-from the high-rolling, corrupt Communist Party minister residing atop the Palac Kultury to the inspiring boiler room staff, drinking their lives away while the tenants are freezing. The movie is about a disintegrating world guided to everyday acts of insanity and seeing them. The portrayal is a bit exaggerated, of course, but it's not far from that time's reality. Humor can be a mighty weapon.

If you live in the USA or Western Europe, you probably cannot realize how the life was beyond the Iron Curtain. Here is the answer. This movie is a comedy, so some things are exaggerated, however, not much. This is a story about people living in socialism. You can see a tree of human dependencies, everyone has someone who is under him, and someone, whom he is afraid of. No-one is going to do anything, only when it gives him profits. No-one is going to make a decision, everyone needs instructions to act. This might be not understandable for people from the West, but really is in Poland. The main character is a sport club president. He has lots of people in his hand, but one day his wife becomes a lover of some minister. She's trying to get money from their account in London. It is necessary to him to be the first. But he has his passport destroyed (it was almost impossible to get a new one in those times), so he finds another way to get the money. He will use all people he can to reach his goal.