Dzien swira

I'm not Polish, but I had the pleasure of visiting most of the country on multiple occasions, I studied there, I dated there. To all the critics who despise the use of profanity, the vulgar approaches of the protagonist, or the economical background, I invite them to take a closer look around Poland. If the described situations are unrealistic, then this is only half true. There are much worse and true facts that are either not mentioned or unexplored in this movie, like the feeling of unsafety, the neediness for capitalism and the exploitation hereof, and the careless and emotionless attitude of the young (men).

Apart from that, this movie nails it. I saw it during a screening in my classes on Polish culture (braught by Polish teachers). I laughed out loud after the first words were uttered when the main character woke up. How sad, but how true his words were. Of course this is satire. What happens here to one person could at most be the combination of a hundred people involved. Still, the pain is real. It's not an easy life out there if you're a local. Everyday is a struggle, the English language is an unrealistic necessity, money is a key word.

Keep an open mind when you watch this one. Seek out the good parts (I enjoyed all the dog references, since I'm not a big dog fan), and know that politically, economically, and privately, this does represent a part of Poland. I love that country though, with all its flaws. It's just not always easy.

The movie gets a 10 from me. I haven't seen anything like it, and I've seen most.

If you're looking for a comedy to spend some time laughing you've got the wrong movie. This one isn't funny and if there scenes to laugh about it's not because they're "funny" but because they're true.

"The Day of the Wacko" is about one day taken from a life of a underpaid, depressed, Polish language teacher in Warsaw. But it's also about getting old and tired of life that seemed so happy and nice at first and then turned into a total disaster - a disaster that a lot of people getting old (not only in Poland) experience. Another movie about Adas Miauczynski is true to the bone, it tries to picture the confrontation between the idealist dreams that all of us had while being young with reality that, often, is depressing and sad. And it does..."The Day of the Wacko" also makes a few points about us, Polish people (or rather people in general), that we often try to hide or make them go away in our minds. I believe each and every person after watching the movie will feel that this it's, even in a flash, about themselves.

The screenplay, and directing is really good, but the movie would be poor if not for some excellent acting by Marek Kondrat as Adas Miauczynski - he's not excellent, he's absolutely wonderful as a man that considers himself as the lowest of the low. In my opinion this is one of the most universal Polish movies ever made (at least after 1989) and anyone interested in Polish cinema should take a while to see it.

10/10

The film does not consist only of flat humor as of vulgar speech and behave of the protagonist but has a very deep social critic (as for example the popping up of 3rd world scenes or showing how neighbors treat each other or in general how people talk to each other). The protagonist appears as a freak but compared to the rest of the world he is the most normal one, it is the behave of the society which leads him to his abnormality. An other strong critical emphasis is put on the consume-society of our world. TV advertisements are shown totally ridiculously and the products they advertise are totally non-sense. It may appear quite funny, but if we think about this fact it is shown like it is in reality. Profit and consume dominate about rationality and humanity. It is one of the best movies I've seen in the last year, the humor is not typical American slapstick or "Al Bundy -like" but the vulgar talking of the protagonist calms the pathetic style and makes it easier to watch and also very funny. A+!!!

DAY OF THE WACKO, directed by Marek Koterski, is a rather droll comedy about the daily life of an eccentric and depressed Polish high-school teacher. He's angry, lonely, underpaid, unappreciated, and can envision no end to his predicament. Imagine a film in which the ambient spirit of Eleanor Rigby is reconfigured as a very frustrated Polish, middle-aged nerd, and you come close to the tone of this dark farce. There are some scenes which are very funny, and others are just plain odd. Yet, overall, the film is worth a look. When the hero visits the beach to relax and unwind, he meets some of the craziest and bizarre characters that one could imagine. A few of these scenes are flat-out hysterical. Bonus Features are all in Polish without sub-titles.

Even though I've lived in Poland for over a year now, I generally don't watch many Polish movies, especially newer ones, which I've found to be very derivative of American and British films. This movie however is a true gem. A rare film that makes you take stock of your own choices in life. The movie focuses on a day (though actually it has to be more than one day) in the life of Adas, a 49 year old high school teacher from Warsaw who's first words to us are "I'm afraid of waking up", and we soon learn thats not all he's afraid of. Adas is deeply dissatisfied with every aspect of his life. From his noisy neighbors, to his broken family, to the Polish government, to his own inability to climb out of his personal hell. Told mostly through narration voice-over which clues us in to Adas's thought process, the film explores the turmoil of middle age with an honesty and poignancy rare in film. While certainly hilarious in moments, this movie serves up an equal (or greater) amount of melancholy as well, balancing the two aspect, delicately. As Adas passes from compulsion to depression, to denial, to rage, we learn more about him, and come to empathize with him. The most striking feature of this movie for me, was the universality of Adas, and the relate-ability to him. Yes he is Polish, with some uniquely Polish complaints and problems, but he could easily be any middle aged man in any western society. While he's a wacko in his own way, what the movie says is, "aren't we all?", "aren't we all this man in some way?" This movie did for me, what hardly any movies do anymore; it made me think and reflect about my own life and my own choices, and any movie that can do that, deserves praise in my book.