There's nothing better than to be a rebellious 18-year-old in a punk band. But in Poland in the early 1980s (Solidarity, strikes, state of siege, tanks in the street) such teenage rebellion is not easy. The adult world forces the sensitive singer Janek to make a choice, with the necessary consequences.
While tension increases in Poland in the early 1980s as a result of the struggle of the trade union movement Solidarity against the Communist regime, four 18-year-old boys decide to start a punk band in a seaside town. All That I Love, the third feature by Jacek Borcuch, concentrates on the singer of the band, the sensitive Janek. He's a young idealist who can lose himself in music, love, his dreams - until the world of adults forces him to make a choice that will have huge consequences.
Borcuch and his crew do a great job of evoking the mood of the 1980s, which in Poland is largely a time of strikes, demonstrations and tanks and soldiers in the street during the state of siege. A period in which young people were forced to grow up very fast. On the soundtrack, Polish punk hits from that time.
PROGRAMMER NOTES
All That I Love is an autobiographical film in which Jacek Borcuch very sensitively creates a coming-of-age story of a boy against the background of political turmoil. The director got his inspiration while listening to a concert and punk-rock music by the Beastie Boys - music from his youth that brought back memories. Music also plays an important role in the life of the main character and there’s a lot of it in the film. Jacek Borcuch does not try to reconstruct the early 1980s in Poland, but focuses on the psyche of a teenager and his growing pains, including his first love. A very fresh film within the Polish context, and also the first Polish film ever in competition at the Sundance Film Festival.
2009 was quite a good year for the Polish film industry and many interesting films appeared during the National Film Festival in Gdynia; there are more Polish films worth seeing and IFFR is offering two of them: Piggies by well-known Robert Glinski and Zero by first-time director Pawel Borowski.
LC