Kanal (1956)Directed By: Andrzej Wajda
Attempting to capture the guilt, fear and frustration of human beings as they straggle through sewers for survival does not sound like an easy or indeed a desirable task. In fact it sounds painful, particularly if the characters you are depicting were the last shred of resistance against a fascist dictatorship. This is the task that Andrzej Wajda set himself back in 1955 when he directed this bitter screenplay.
World War Two was top of the agenda for almost every history lesson throughout senior school, but the grizzly fate of the Polish resistance during the Warsaw Uprising of 1944 was never something my teachers felt necessary to explore. Perhaps that is because there is no chance, when telling that particular story, to praise the valiant British troops and chortle at how Churchill saved the United Kingdom. Churchill's conquests are of course extremely relevant to our modern history of Britain, but so to is the plight of the Polish people the allied forces set out to save, and that imperative angle is often left to filmmakers and writers, such as Wajda, in order for foreign audiences to be aware of what happened.
However, even though this is a fictitious film based on true events, it must be remembered that the plight of the characters is portrayed through the eyes of Andrzej Wajda, Polands most prestigious filmmaker and a man I have the highest regard for. His ability to combine history, biography and politics at such aesthetic heights, dazzles me to the point of bewilderment. Kanal is no exception to his vast body of work.
The film focuses on a band of soldiers fighting against German forces in Warsaw just moments before they are forced to retreat. As often characterised by Wajda, the central character displays a bold act of heroism in destroying a German tank before he is critically wounded by enemy fire. The audience is made aware at the very beginning of the film that Kanal portrays the final moments of the characters' lives and so their mercy is at the hands of the films running time. This makes for a bleak introduction that only gets bleaker as Wajdas characters are propelled through death in the sewers.
Kanal, like so many of Wajda's films, is a testament to heroism and bravery in the face of defeat. The pitch black sequences of Wajda's cast crawling through fresh sewerage, searching for an exit, punctuate the sheer terror that the Polish people went through during the time of the Warsaw Uprising. Kanal is difficult to watch; it is a dismal reminder of the not so distant past, a statement to national determination and the terror inflicted on Europe during the 20th Century.
