In Stalinist Poland, cabaret singer Tonia decides to spend the evening drinking with a group of friends. The next morning, she awakes to find that, for reasons unknown to her, she has been jailed as a political prisoner. As prison officials interrogate, torture and humiliate her, she fights for survival and to maintain her innocence by refusing to sign a false confession. As her years of imprisonment pass, her relationship with her captors grows more complicated.
Acting
Krystyna Janda's volcanic, Oscar-worthy performance.
Direction
Bugajski's suffocating single-room tension.
Writing
Dialogue that weaponizes bureaucratic banality.
Director
Ryszard Bugajski
Krystyna Janda
Antonina Dziwisz
Adam Ferency
Lieutenant Morawski
Janusz Gajos
Major Zawada "Kąpielowy"
Agnieszka Holland
Communist Witkowska
Bożena Dykiel
Honorata
Olgierd Łukaszewicz
Konstanty Dziwisz
Anna Romantowska
Mira Szajnert
Tomasz Dedek
UB Officer
Jan Jurewicz
Guard
Jarosław Kopaczewski
UB Officer
Arkadiusz Bazak
Officer at Name-Day Party
Antonina Girycz
Cell Top Dog
Tomasz Lengren
Major Olcha
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Shot in 1981 but banned by Polish authorities until 1989; premiered after communism fell.
Janda based her performance on real victims she interviewed, smuggling their testimonies into celluloid.
PL
