Wilhelm and Anka Sasnal's debut feature exposes the underbelly of life in a small Polish village. By Ben Walters
It Looks Pretty from a Distance lives up to its name. The debut feature by Polish husband-and-wife team Wilhelm and Anka Sasnal, shot on 35mm, demonstrates an artist’s eye for colour, composition and telling detail. Less charming is the story this Tiger competitor tells, of entrenched grudges and resentments that find increasingly degrading and violent expression in a small rural community.
“That’s the experience you get passing these villages between our hometown and the city where we live now,” says Wilhelm Sasnal of the film’s tantalising title. “We used to pass them quite often and we always wondered what’s behind the fences – these farms, very picturesque from a distance, but once we decided to stop and have a closer look some of the houses were really messy, in total disorder. That’s where the initial idea for the film came from – when we saw the chaos, the everyday activity of this life very close to the earth, and we linked it to our knowledge of the past, especially the events of the Second World War in those communities.”
Not that Sasnal wanted to single out these particular people. “This is not about the Polish soul or villagers’ souls,” he insists. “This is about human nature. These things could happen anywhere – setting the story today makes it more universal, though of course we refer strongly to the Polish past; the looting and selling of Jews to the Germans during the war. For years, these things weren’t disclosed – until 1989 we were always the victims. No, not just victims; we were sometimes on the evil side. Sometimes you cannot control your anger. When the crowd is too big, the bad energy wants you to destroy or to kill.”
The project developed in an organic, albeit somewhat cautious, manner. “We stopped at households we liked and visited quite often for about two years. At first, they were a bit reluctant but finally we became… well, maybe not friends, but I liked these people and they liked me. There was also the opportunity for them to get money – we paid them to let us run around with our camera and film them.” Some of the villagers appear as extras in the film, though the speaking parts are taken by professional actors.
The Sasnals are experienced artists – Wilhelm as a painter and short filmmaker, Anka as a writer – but It Looks Pretty from a Distance is their feature debut. (Well, almost: an early experiment was discarded. “We made it but put it away on a shelf. It doesn’t exist anymore. This is the one we’re happy with.”) The duo had certain advantages: they were able to finance the film with their own funds and backing from the gallery Wilhelm works with, and they could draw on the shared references and collaborative shorthand of a two-decade partnership: “we’ve been together for longer than we haven’t been,” Wilhelm notes.
The film hasn’t been widely screened yet in Poland, but has proved polarizing among those who have seen it. “Some people liked it, some people didn’t,” Sasnal says. “No one was indifferent. We didn’t care that much. We made this film for ourselves. We think evil should be named for what it is.”
More about It Looks Pretty from a Distance here.