1983
Polish with English Subtitles
Season 1 (2018) – 8 Episodes approx. 50 minutes each
Season 2 - TBD
5 out of 5 Paws
1983 is a Polish alternative-history series. What if Solidarity never succeeded in separating Poland from the Soviet regime? In 1983 multiple terrorist attacks caused the Solidarity movement to fail and 20 years later, in 2003, Poland is still under a Soviet-backed regime, where protest and sedition of any kind is punished. The two main characters are Anton Janow, a former senior police detective who was busted for being outspoken; and Kajetan Skowron, a young law student whose parents died in the 1983 uprising. Anton is suspicious of a young man’s suicide and meets resistance from higher ups when he tries to investigate further. Kajetan is given a case file by his professor which involves someone that he knew that was murdered before the resistance was knocked out. Anton just happens to be the detective that investigated the murder. Kajetan meets Anton and asks him to reinvestigate the case – this turns out badly when government officials intercept the meeting and beat Anton up. Apparently the government doesn’t want anyone prying into the events surrounding the murder. Add on to this that a new resistance movement is starting their own terrorist activity aided by the large Vietnamese community in Warsaw. The suicide was a member of the resistance – or was he a mole planted by the government? The series is dark and moody; however the plot is intriguing, well-scripted, and the actors believable. It is an interesting concept of what might have happened if the Soviet Union hadn’t broken up. Al Gore as U.S. president? Really?
Signs (Znaki)
Polish with English Subtitles
Season 1 (2020) – 8 Episodes approx. 45 minutes each
Season 2 – TBD
3 out of 5 paws
Signs takes place in the fictional mountain village of Sowie Doly (Owl Town) Poland. A murder has striking similarities to a decades old cold case – both young women were shot twice in the heart. Newly arrived police chief, Trela, takes over the case – but he has secrets of his own. He and his daughter, Nina, are staying in a boarding house run by Ada – who is also his second in command at the police station – and her husband, Blazej. Now this is where it gets complicated. Blazej was having an affair with the newly murdered woman who is Ada’s best friend, Patryzja. Patryzja stole money from the company that she works for. Her daughter, Kasia, finds the money and gives it to Agata, the mayor’s daughter, in order to keep it away from her father – who just got out of jail for raping two women. Trela’s daughter, Nina, becomes friends with Ada. Their friend, Martyna – who is sleeping with Ada’s boyfriend, Radek, becomes the third murder victim. Ada tries to incriminate Radek by planting the money in his house. Ada’s brother, Robert, was involved in the death / suicide of the former police chief’s, Dzikowski, son many years ago – who might have been involved in the first woman’s death. Robert is hiding out on the farm of a lay pastor, Jonasz, who also sells spiked holy water. The town is getting ready to celebrate the town’s 800th anniversary – however, the unearthing of several possible concentration camp slaves remains might cause disruptions. Confused yet? There are way too many subplots in this series – some of them are never explained, but just leave you hanging. The acting is wooden – the script pretty laughable, but it is beautifully shot in several locations in south western Poland. A Season 2 has been completed and shown on Polish tv but has yet to make an appearance on Netflix.
The Crime
Polish with English Subtitles
Season 1 (2014) – 3 Episodes approx. 42 minutes each
Season 2 (2015) – 3 Episodes approx. 42 minutes each
3 out of 5 paws
The Crime (Zbrodnia) is a Polish mini-series first aired on Netflix in 2014. The peaceful lives of the residents inhabiting a seaside town are shaken following a series of macabre crimes. In the opening scene Agnieszka, a mother enjoying beach time with her children, discovers a corpse entangled in fishing nets off the shoreline of Hel, a pretty seaside town in northern Poland. The corpse is identified as Piotr Miernus, a former inhabitant of the town. As Hel’s police department is small, Tomek, a detective from the neighbouring city of Gydnia is called in to help with the investigation. Tomek and his partner Monika, a junior detective, follow the corpse’s sister Ewa from Gydnia back to Hel, but lose her overnight. The next morning Ewa is found dead under suspicious circumstances. It turns out that Agnieszka and Tomek know each other from high school and end up solving the case. In the second season Agnieszka and Tomek get involved in another case, a murder that takes place in broad day light during a horse race on the beach. The storyline is pretty simple, and the acting kind of stilted, but I enjoyed watching the series – kind of a cross between The Beachcombers and The Hardy Boys (but in Polish). Plus I never imagined that Poland had such a pretty beach resort town – the cinematography is well done
The Mire
Polish with English Subtitles
Season 1 (2020) – 8 Episodes approx. 48 minutes each
3 out of 5 paws
Set in Poland in the 1980s, The Mire takes place in a traditionally calm, quaint town. A prostitute is found brutally murdered in the woods and her death is at first written off as a crime of passion committed by her boyfriend. As a possible suicide comes to light two reporters from a local paper suspect that there is more to the story. Piotr is young and impulsive, newly arrived from Krakow. Witold is older and more experienced and has been in the area for decades. Piotr believes it is a political coverup. Witold has been involved with the suicide’s family. Together they have to put aside their differences and get to the bottom of this case. The series is dark and gritty, grim and moody. The cinematography is excellent, the acting well-done, and overall the series is an interesting perspective of life in Poland in the early ‘80s.
The Plagues of Breslau
Polish with English Subtitles
Movie – 1 hr 32 minutes
3 out of 5 paws
The movie is a psychological police crime thriller about serial killings over the space of a week in Wroclaw, Poland. The first victim shows up in a marketplace, sewn into a cows’ hide and baked / suffocated to death. The next is torn apart by horses. The next victims are done on a daily basis, usually at 6pm. All the victims have words cut or branded into their bodies for individual crimes – ‘Degenerate’,’Slanderer’, etc. The lead investigator Helena tries to find logic and method amongst the killings, but it is not until another investigator from Warsaw, Iwona, arrives that the motive appears. Apparently the killings, all of them extremely gory, are based on an old story from Wroclaw’s’ (then known as Breslau) past three hundred years ago when the king had someone executed daily at 6pm for the same type of crimes. Helena and Iwona work together to solve the serial killings – will they be successful? The movie is fairly predictable, but reasonably well acted – and there is lots of scenery of Wroclaw, a city that I have visited and enjoyed being to.
The Woods
Polish with English Subtitles
Season 1 (2019) – 6 Episodes approx.. 48 minutes each
Season 2 - ?? TBA ??
4 out of 5 paws
‘The Woods’ – based on Harlen Coben’s novel of the same name – takes place in Poland and revolves around Pawel, a prosecutor whose life has been shrouded in grief and mystery since his sister disappeared 25 years ago. The series alternates between the events that happened at a summer camp where 4 teens went missing one night and the present where Pawel becomes involved in the investigation of a murder. Two of the teens were found brutally murdered – the other two, including Pawel’s sister Kamilla, were never found at all. Pawel was a counsellor at the summer camp – his mother, who later deserted him, was the camp’s director. The flashbacks lead up to what actually happened that night. The present follows Pawel’s investigation – the murder victim may be the other missing teen Artur, and if so then Kamilla may still be alive!! I don’t like film adaptations of Harlen Coben’s books – the acting on British versions – ‘The Stranger’ and ‘Safe’ – was horrible and the plots ludicrous and unbelievable. I almost didn’t watch the remainder of ‘The Woods’ after the first episode, but as I enjoy Polish movies I gave it a second chance – and found that it was well done. The plot was more believable, the acting more subtle and less heavy handed, and the cinematography (after the first episode which was too dark) excellent – I find that Polish and Russian movies have the best cinematography on Netflix. ‘The Woods’ gave all the answers that the book did – and the story should be complete. However, there are enough unanswered questions, and the viewer response has been excellent, that Netflix might have a second season starting in 2021.
Ultraviolet
Polish with English Subtitles
Season 1 (2017) – 10 Episodes approx.. 42 minutes each
4 out of 5 paws
Season 2 (2019) – 12 Episodes approx.. 42 minutes each
4 out of 5 paws
Season 3 - TBD
The series revolves around a thirty-year-old woman (Ola Serafin) who has to move back to her hometown of Łódź Poland from London for undisclosed reasons. One night, while working at her job as an Uber like driver she almost has an accident when a body is thrown off an overpass and crashes into a car just ahead of her. She thinks it’s a murder – the police on arriving at the scene write it off as just another suicide. Having had unsatisfactory dealings before with the police (her brother was murdered by his wife) Ola turns to the internet to see if she can find out any information about the supposed suicide. This is where she finds Ultraviolet, a group of online amateur detectives from all over Poland who work on unsolved cases – and have a pretty good clearance rate. The group uses social media – the internet, Facebook, online blogs, etc – and other resources to quickly solve crimes that the police can’t or won’t investigate further. Ola joins the group and is soon able to determine who was murdered and by whom. The group is a pretty mixed bunch – a teenage boy genius, two sisters that host a fashion tip blog, an airport security worker, a retired auto insurance investigator,etc. For the most part Ultraviolet never meet in person but solve the crimes online – with the exception of Ola, and a police detective Marek – who at first dismisses the group as amateurs, but soon enlists their aid in future cases. Ultraviolet is a procedural drama, so all the cases get solved in 45 minutes or less and you need your imagination to follow the leaps of logic – i.e. this is an obvious clue, well … maybe only obvious to the screenwriters. But it is fun to watch, the dialog between Ola and her crippled is hilarious, the cases take on a lot of todays issues – racism, physical abuse, political corruption, etc, and you get to see a lot of a little known (at least to North American audiences) part of Poland. Plus it’s almost scary to see how the Internet and modern technology can impact and track our daily lives. I have thoroughly enjoyed Season 1 and can’t wait for Season 2.
Season 2 takes off about 6 months after the last episode of season 1. Ola is still trying to prove that her sister-in-law murdered Ola’s brother. Tomek is a new father. Piast, the techie genius, has graduated from high school and has started University. The twins, Dorota and Regina, are doing well with their fashion blog. The Ultraviolet gang have gone public – they now have a website where they are often contacted by people who require help with the investigation. The police have stopped resisting Ultraviolet’s help and now join them in solving crimes. Michal, the primary police detective in season 1, only lasts for two episodes and is replaced by Kuba – who had run-ins with the Warsaw Police Department and has been accused of corruption. Although Ola is still the main star of the show, season 2 tends to focus on the other members of the team and their families. One nice touch of the show is that it covers more of Poland and has scenes done in Warsaw and Krakow as well as more shots of Lodz. I like the show, it’s a little different, and I also get to enjoy more Polish culture – plus I get to practice and improve my fluency in Polish.
There might be a season 3 but no announcement has been forth coming.