Le Rapport Pilecki

Pilecki's story is surely one of the most incredible, impressive, and heartbreaking ones in the history of World War II, certainly on the European side.

I look at it with the same amazement and admiration as I did at the story of Desmond Doss.

People like those two only grace the pages of history sparsely and in its most horrific chapters.

Now, the reason I titled my review "Not For The Uninformed" is that "Pilecki's Report" tells a story already very well known to Polish audiences.

Everyone in Poland knows Pilecki's story (and if they don't, they sure as hell should get to know it most ricky-tick!) so, for someone outside of Poland or with limited knowledge of World War II history in that part of the world, THIS FILM MAY AND PROBABLY WILL BE CONFUSING.

I would say don't watch it without taking a look at a few documentaries or reading up on Pilecki first...although that might somewhat spoil the movie for you.

Or you can look up more information on Pilecki afterwards instead. The choice is yours.

All I'm trying to tell you is that the movie was made with the assumption that people watching it already knew the subject matter.

But hey, wasn't it the case with "Titanic" too!?

Everyone in the world knew the damn thing sank but we all still gasped at Cameron's depiction of the events and the plot within the film, didn't we?

The movie itself, as far as the filmmaking side of things is concerned, is outstanding, especially the cinematography and lighting.

The music (by Michal Lorenc), although subtle most of the time, is also worth mentioning.

Acting and production design are fantastic as well.

A great movie overall.

I personally couldn't find anything in it to complain about. But then again, I know Pilecki's story and I'm familiar with World War II history of Poland well enough to not need any background to the way the story is told by the director/writer.

He made the movie assuming the audience was already educated on European WWII history and I'm sure he deliberately wrote and structured the movie to first and foremost target Polish audience. And that's the way you have to look at it.

If you don't have a reasonable grasp of what was happening in Europe between 1933 and 1945, and then, specifically in Poland, between 1939 and 1945 and beyond, you may be lost a little.

But here again, most historical movies will be confusing to anyone whose knowledge about any period of history is superficial at best.

If you customarily go for goofy superhero crap for your dose of cinema, I suggest you don't even touch heavy material like "Pilecki's Report" - you'll only waste your time and complain the movie was boring and confusing afterwards.

Wow I have say,congratulations to the polish film industry for their outstanding recreation of a truly brave patriot. He lived trough the impossible only to be sacrificed on paranoid communists altar..,heartbreaking and inspirational movie about Witold Pilecki a intelligent officer captain in the polish cavalry a partisan in the resistance a participant in the Warsaw uprising and a auschwitz survivor. Yes it's sounds like a fictional character but he was all that and more. The movie does capture his struggle and bravery in a realistic way. The actors are all very good and costumes and set on par.

Rating: 6.8/10 -------------- This 2 hour movie is based on a true story. During the first hour of the movie, it is difficult to understand what exactly is going on. That there are a lot of jumps in time, doesn't really help either.

After an hour, the story starts to become more clear. From that point, the movie becomes a worthwile watch.

At the end of the movie, I was left with quite a lot of questions. Why on earth was this hero being prosecuted?! Who were all these other people that were being accused of co-conspiring.

I think we have a clear case of having a great story, but a director and writing team that is unable to make in into a movie that is representative for the story.

I still think this movie is a worthwile watch. Especially because of the historical relevance. The first hour is not easy to watch, but the second hour is pretty okay. That part of the movie also includes some impressive scenes of Auschwitz.

Overall, I score this movie at 6.8/10, making it a 7-star IMDb rating.

A story that should be engrossing, emotive, and shocking, isn't any of those things. It is interesting, of course, and the cinematography is strong, but the direction and script seem inadequate. There is no real emotional depth to anything or anyone, and the writing seems to be behind this. It is very matter-of-fact, and the use of a constantly shifting timeline doesn't work - a linear biopic style would have been more compelling. With the gravity of the source material, it would have been both informative and useful to include more of an introduction to events and their significance. All-in-all, this seems to be a failure of the Director.