Silver Bear winner Kasia Adamik (Spoor [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Agnieszka Holland
intervista: Zofia Wichlacz
scheda film], the series 1983) is now shooting a new project, a Cold War-set thriller titled Winter of the Crow.

The script is based on a short story by Olga Tokarczuk, a Nobel Prize in Literature winner and one of the most acclaimed authors of her generation in Poland. The project has entered production in Warsaw and is set in the “surreal and cinematic world” of the Polish capital in 1981.

The official synopsis reads as follows: “When martial law is imposed overnight, shutting down the country, visiting guest lecturer and British psychiatry professor Dr Joan Andrews arrives just as taxis have been replaced by tanks and citizens are treated like criminals. But as chaos engulfs the city, armed with her camera, she witnesses a brutal murder by the secret police. In mortal danger and trapped as Poland is closed down, Joan becomes a hunted fugitive running for her life.”

The cast is toplined by Lesley Manville (who here plays Dr Andrews and recently portrayed Princess Margaret in the Netflix hit The Crown), alongside Tom Burke (True Things [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Harry Wootliff
scheda film], The Souvenir [+leggi anche:
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scheda film]), Zofia Wichłacz (World on Fire) and Andrzej Konopka (The Lure [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Agnieszka Smoczyńska
scheda film], Nina [+leggi anche:
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scheda film]). Tomasz Naumiuk (Green Border [+leggi anche:
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scheda film]) is attached as the feature’s DoP.

Speaking about her project, the helmer said: “I vividly remember my first encounter with the celebrated short novel Professor Andrews Goes to Warsaw. This story felt intensely personal. As a child, I lived in a satellite city of Warsaw. After emigrating to the West, I would dream of the concrete labyrinth of grey high-rises, a weird no man’s land of never-ending, muddy construction sites, reminiscent of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil. Now Professor Andrews has found herself in my labyrinth, a dreamlike universe where rules are unknown and absurdity reigns, on the border of the real and phantasmagorical world.”

Winter of the Crow is being produced by Olga Chajdas, Stanislaw Dziedzic, Katarzyna Ozga, Nicolas Steil and Sam Taylor for Wild Mouse Production (Poland), Film Produkcja (Poland), Iris Productions (Luxembourg) and Film and Music Entertainment Ltd (UK), and co-produced by Douglas Cummins. The director’s mother and veteran filmmaker Agnieszka Holland is serving as the executive producer with R Paul Miller, James DeMasi, Jonny Boston, Archil Gelovani and Ursula Romero Gerberding for ISB (Spain).

The UK’s HanWay is launching world sales on the picture at the upcoming European Film Market (15-21 February) in Berlin.