![]() This film was supposed to appeal more to the heart than to the brain. How do you express emotions or beautiful things like physical love? How do you put them in a documentary? You can have the characters tell it to the other characters, but it doesn’t make you really feel it. And I feel that I did a good job capturing what I was noticing and seeing around that time and turning it into a cinematic language. Many, many people have told me that that is exactly how their life is, in Warsaw. I think it really has to come down to what is your definition of a documentary the philosophical concept behind it. ![]() It was a conscious choice to have it premiere in the documentary competition at Sundance and start its life there, because I think the film is very much tethered to reality and to me it is definitely a documentary about the emotions of youth and what it means to be young. I think that some films are easy to label, and it’s good to label them, and I think some…you know, honestly, I can’t answer that question. ![]() Michal Marczak: I like that there is no clear genre designation, and would like to keep it that way. If go to IMDb right now and look up your film, there is no clear genre designation. Hammer to Nail : When I saw your film last year for its Sundance release, it was pitched as a documentary, and in fact it won a Directing Award for World Cinema Documentary at that festival. Here is a condensed digest of our conversation, edited for clarity. I did not re-watch it before our conversation, but remember being simultaneously entranced by its mise-en-scène and disappointed by some parts of its content (what is new in feeling lost after graduation?). Neither entirely fiction nor nonfiction, the movie is part of a new wave of films that defy genre classification. A beautifully shot, elliptical meditation on post-college malaise, the film uses ostensible non-actors (we learn more about this in the interview, below) playing mostly true versions of themselves. So if watching a mostly abstract film from Poland that may or may not be a documentary seems like your cup of tea, you'll most likely have to catch it on VOD or eventually on DVD/Blu-ray.I recently spoke by phone with Polish filmmaker Michal Marczak on the occasion of the recent theatrical release of his 2016 Sundance-winning documentary hybrid feature All These Sleepless Nights ( which I reviewed last year). Given the abstract-leaning and plot-less nature of this movie, I cannot see this playing more than one week in the theater. The Saturday matinée screening where I saw this at was attended poorly (4 people, including myself). "All These sleepless Nights" opened this weekend out of the blue and without any fanfare at my local art-house theater here in Cincinnati. Let me admit that I struggled big time to make it to the end of "All These Sleepless Nights", as I never connected with any of these characters (or real people), I kept hoping that it would draw me in eventually, but it simply didn't happen. In fact, this movie reminds me of the latest Terrence Mallick movie "Song to Song. ![]() Which leads me to ask: is this movie a documentary or a fiction feature in which the characters happen to play themselves? (I didn't realize that until seeing the end credits.) When I said I should spoil more of the plot, you need to take this with a grain of salt, as there really is no plot to speak of, and much of what we see playing out appears to be improvised. Couple of comments: this is the latest movie from up-and-coming Polish writer-director Michal Marczak, best known as a documentary maker. What will become of the guys? And of Eva? To tell you more of the plot would spoil your viewing experience, you'll just have to see for yourself how it all plays out. Then one day at yet another party, they run into Eva, who takes an immediate liking to the guys. After that, we follow the two guys as they roam the streets of Warsaw, seemingly going from one party to the next, and the next after that, while they discuss love and the meaning of life. We then watch Michal at a party interacting with Monika, who looks to be an ex-girlfriend. As the movie opens, we are informed what the meaning of the term "Reminiscence Bump" is while massive fire works go off. "All These Sleepless Nights" (2016 release from Poland 100 min.) brings the story of two college-aged friends, Krzysztof and Michal. ![]()
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