A traffic jam so long it spawned its own underground economy—and one very wanted Pole.
In the TV film Polonaise, traffic jams have grown into a phenomenon in which traffic jam call girls, hairdressers and photographers enliven the endless delays. The film follows a number of people in a jam on the A5. The central character is a Pole in an expensive Saab Convertible, who is wanted by the police. A red Panda carries the heavily pregnant Hilde and her cynical sister. Hilde is worried because she has not seen her friend anymore after a quarrel. In an old Saab, a young couple is bickering. She is a `yuppie cunt' who stakes her marriage for a parking licence and is tired of her husband smoking dope. Charlie the music promoter is driving his son's car. He likes traffic jams, because they allow him to settle his deals undisturbed and meet his secret love, the traffic jam call girl Nena. While the characters are confronted with each other and themselves more and more, tension rises to a peak. A radio pirate connects the story lines with his chatter.
Writing
Radio pirate narrator stitching chaos into coherence.
Direction
Turning gridlock into genuinely kinetic visual storytelling.
Acting
Hajo Bruins making traffic-jam serenity feel dangerous.
Director
Nicole van Kilsdonk
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The A5 highway jam was a genuine 1990s Dutch phenomenon; van Kilsdonk fictionalized a real national irritant into existential theater.
The film's claustrophobia mirrors early 2000s European cinema's obsession with contained spaces—see also 'Dogville' and 'Cube'—but with more cigarettes and less nihilism.
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