Logo Polskiego Radia

Award-winning heart transplant movie 'Gods' premieres

PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge 08.10.2014 09:11
Gods, an unlikely comedy about the maverick doctor who made Poland's first successful heart transplant, had its Warsaw premiere on Tuesday night.

Actor
Actor Tomasz Kot, who plays the late surgeon Zbigniew Religa in Gods. Photo: PAP/ Stach Lezczynski

The eagerly anticipated movie, which focuses on larger than life surgeon Zbigniew Religa, who died in 2008, goes into cinemas fresh from scooping the top award at the annual Gdynia Film Festival last month.

The film is set in the 1980s, but director Lukasz Palkowski found a goldmine of humour in the straitened conditions of communist Poland.

Lukasz
Lukasz Palkowski.Photo: PAP/ Stach Lezczynski

“Polish films are always very sad, and people don't like that,” Palkowski told Polish Radio's English Section in Gdynia.

“So I made a film with a light touch.”

The movie, Gods, is also a landmark for actor Tomasz Kot, who won the Best Actor gong in Gdynia this autumn.

Religa, who went on to become a presidential candidate after the collapse of communism, is fondly remembered by many Poles.

Kot said that Religa's breakthrough operation in 1985, after years of struggle, was a triumph against the odds.

“This happened in very difficult times for Poland,” he reflected

“It was impossible for everyone, apart from this one man.”

“He's a great person for all Poles, because he did a lot of good – people are living today [because of him].

Meanwhile, director Lukasz Palkowski has revealed that his next project will also involve taking an unconventional approach to Poland's past. He intends to make a film about Polish pickpockets in Warsaw in World War II.

“There will be no heroes,” he quipped.

Gods goes on general release across Poland on Friday. (nh)

Print
Copyright © Polskie Radio S.A About Us Contact Us