The genre-fluid eastern Scarborn was presented at this year’s European Days of Film Festival as well as the Summer Film School (Letní filmová škola Uherské Hradiště). In its home country of Poland, it won six national film awards, including Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Costumes. Set in 18th century Poland, the historical film demythologises the figure of national hero Tadeusz Kościuszko. Scarborn will be released countrywide on August 8!

Revolution through the eyes of the ordinary

Tadeusz Kościuszko was one of the catalysts of the national uprising against Russia. The film's director Paweł Maślona revises the way Polish history is told on screen. He presents history not through the perspective of important dignitaries, but through the prism of ordinary people from the lower classes. For this reason, Kościuszko is not a protagonist. We follow the story through a poor peasant played by Bartosz Bielenia, who has made his mark on the audience's memory primarily as a fake priest in the raw coming-of-age story of Corpus Christi. Scarborn thus relies on period realities and everyday life against the backdrop of great history, rather than a didactic retelling of marquee events.

Concept of history and genre

Although Maślona draws from historic sources, he composes a genre narrative of his own. Underneath the layers of western tropes, he foregrounds women's rights and oppression, making the film relevant to today. The genre mix combines elements of intimate melodrama with Quentin Tarantino's aesthetics, to which the director proudly subscribes, as well as the work of Sam Peckinpah. At the same time, however, he emphasises the local poetics of Polish cinema and the importance of tradition and folklore. He discards the tendentious biographical narrative and tells the story of the universal struggle for human freedom and minority rights, creating a history film both unconventional and memorable.

Polish talent

Paweł Maślona worked his way up from the position of assistant director and in 2017 debuted with the tragicomedy Panic Attack, which was screened in the main competition of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. He has also directed several popular TV series in Poland, namely the crime drama Motyw. He is not an auteur, but a very skilled eclectic and genre storyteller. The script of his second film was written by journalist Michał A. Zieliński. Maślona said that the script was an imaginary gift for him and that it enabled him to finally address the issue of serfdom. He is currently working on Lovetown, an adaptation of Michal Witkowski's bestselling novel, which thematises the Polish gay community against the backdrop of political change.