A novelty in Polish filmmaking was that it was possible to find funds for a big production. However, at the same time, the state budget committed less and less money to filmmaking.
Andrzej Wajda

Also a great part of Polish industry proved to have existed only to support the Soviet military industry, and it became superfluous and incapable of being transformed into anything else. We did not foresee that or the magnitude of these phenomena.
Andrzej Wajda

As I said earlier, there are no writers who could create a literary vision of the new reality.
Andrzej Wajda

At the same time, television theatre became more visibly active.
Andrzej Wajda

Cinemas gained new young audiences who wanted films made for them.
Andrzej Wajda

Even better, there were established two separate committees deciding on state film funding.
Andrzej Wajda

Eventually, the state's funding covered only the stages leading to presenting a film project to potential funding bodies. It was enough to produce a script, indicate casting and put together a budget to present it all, but nothing beyond that.
Andrzej Wajda

Films made in the spirit of the past continued to be made.
Andrzej Wajda

However, that old mode of Polish filmmaking virtually disappeared.
Andrzej Wajda

In Europe, there is no television filmmaking legislation that could assist film production because private broadcasters are not interested in supporting Polish film.
Andrzej Wajda


In the first years after 1989, films were partly financed from the state's budget as well as by public television. Still, except for a few special cases, most films are made this way.
Andrzej Wajda

In the first years after the systemic transition, our screens showed American entertainment that had not been available before, or had been available only sporadically.
Andrzej Wajda

In the forty years of the people's republic, some of the worst historical traits were preserved in our people. These included even the common characteristics developed in the economic reality of the time of partitions in the 17th and 18th centuries.
Andrzej Wajda

In the same period, Polish literature also underwent some significant changes. From social-political literature, which had a great tradition and strong motivation to be that way, Polish literature changed its focus to a psychological rather than a social one.
Andrzej Wajda

It turned out that the country was helpless in the face of a new reality.
Andrzej Wajda

It was progressively more difficult to find work in the theatre, as well.
Andrzej Wajda

Language also encodes our past. We want to know who we are. To know who we are, we have to know who we used to be. Consequently, our literature, written in the past, anchors us in that past.
Andrzej Wajda

Nevertheless, in the theatre, and in the cinema, the contemporary reality of Poland has been represented only to a minuscule degree in the last 12 years.
Andrzej Wajda

On the one hand, we had great filmic spectacles that brought in big audiences, adults as well as primary and secondary school students. On the other hand, there were attempts to create contemporary Polish film.
Andrzej Wajda

On the one hand, young theatre directors were coming to television theatre, because they wanted to get closer to the cinema, despite having studied and worked for the theatre.
Andrzej Wajda