The Peasants

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The small village of Lipce appears frozen in time in a post-feudal area where serfdom had been abolished only decades earlier.

Reviewed at Busan Film Festival (Flash Forward), Oct. 8, 2023. Also in Toronto Film Festival. Running Time: 114 MIN. (Original title: "Chlopi") It was incredibly liberating for us. This is very fast-paced, we have dances, we have this big battle. And we were able to be free with the camera, to have that camera get inside the action,” Hugh Welchman added. The film features works from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, with an emphasis on Young Poland artists. It includes interpretations of works by artists such as Józef Chełmoński, Ferdynand Ruszczyc and Leon Wyczółkowski. [2] Józef Chełmoński's works used in a film include the following: [ citation needed]The Peasants (15)". British Board of Film Classification. 13 November 2023 . Retrieved 13 November 2023. Indeed, we see that tsarist occupation has little effect on the day-to-day lives of Reymont’s characters whilst direct control over the unfortunates is wielded by wealthier peasants and the local Polish landowner, who at one point manages to channel away peasant anger by appealing to nationalist sentiment. The story was a metaphor for the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and was banned from 1945 to 1989 in communist Poland, along with George Orwell's similar novella, Animal Farm (published in Britain in 1945). Reymont's novel was reprinted in Poland in 2004. D.K. Welchman insisted the novel itself used naturalism to depict everyday life, including peasants, villagers and pastoral animals. But Reymont was also in parts wonderfully evocative in his picturesque descriptions of characters, down to their costumes and mannerisms. Over the course of four seasons – Autumn to Summer – the tangled skein of their story unravels, watched eagerly by the other peasants: the gossip Jagustynka, pious Roch, hot-blooded Mateusz, gentle Witek … Richly lyrical and thrillingly realist, at turns comic, tragic and reflective, Wladyslaw Reymont’s magnum opus is a love song to a lasting dream of rural Poland, and to the eternal, timeless matters of the heart.

As of July 2023 [update], the film had been sold to over 40 countries. [13] In September 2023, Sony Pictures Classics acquired distribution rights to the film for North and Latin America, the Middle East, Australia and New Zealand. [14] Reception [ edit ] To do that, the filmmakers turned to a wide repertoire of realist and pre-Impressionist paintings, drawing from the work of artists from the Young Poland movement, a modernist period roughly spanning the years from 1890-1918. They were equally inspired by the evocative language of the novel itself, which “reads like a painting” in its vivid, descriptive passages, according to Hugh. Reymont harboured political leanings towards the clandestine and nationalistic National Democratic Party that was active around the time he wrote his work. I also found the level of antisemitism disconcerting. A Jewish tavern-keeper is an agent of evil in the plot. But he is only one of several such agents, so I can accept that. It wasn't so easy to accept frequent use of the term, "Jew", in a pejorative sense. The novel's setting was destined to be the center of the Holocaust only 15 years later, so the antisemitism was a fact of life in that time and place. Despite being married to Maciej Boryna, Jagna still has a secret affair with the exiled Antek. Maciej repeatedly catches his wife with his son. In addition, Maciej is troubled by the decision of the landowners' court to cut down forests belonging to the peasants. He gathers men from the village to take revenge on the landowners. During the Fierce fight with the landowners' emissaries Maciej is seriously injured, for which Antek takes brutal revenge. The fights are interrupted by the intrusion of Russian troops, who arrest many peasants from Lipce, including Antek. Meanwhile Jagna, accused of bringing misfortune upon the village, struggles with increasing isolation.These scenes are extremely dynamic scenes, with the camera following the characters, and flying into the heart of the action. To make the first fully oil painting animated film ( Loving Vincent) we had to come up with a raft of cinematic and technical innovations, but The Peasants sets the bar much higher.” Goodfellow, Melanie (28 June 2023). " 'The Peasants' Teaser: Makers Of Oscar-Nominated 'Loving Vincent' Return With "More Spectacular" 19th Century Epic Drama". Deadline . Retrieved 1 August 2023. When the MOREFILM animation studio in Kyiv which run by two producers Olga Zhurzhenko and Desniana Rozhkova was closed down overnight in February 2022, after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the film's producers launched a rapid response to help the Ukrainian artists and their families, moving as many as possible to Poland to continue working. As not all Ukrainian artists were able to leave, in August 2022 BreakThru Films helped to relaunch the MOREFILM animation studio in Kyiv, providing work for fifteen painters and staff. [2]

a b "The Peasants world premiere on Toronto International Film Festival". Film in Serbia. 28 July 2023 . Retrieved 1 August 2023. Directors: DK Welchman, Hugh Welchman. Screenplay: DK Welchman, Hugh Welchman adapted from the novel "The Peasants" by Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont. Camera: Radoslaw Ladczuk. Editor: DK Welchman. Music: Lukasz Rostowski. The Peasants chronicles the goings-on within Lipce over the course of a year, with each volume corresponding to a season. Impressionism - a style in painting developed in France in the late 19th century that uses colour to show the effects of light on things and to suggest atmosphere rather than showing exact details. In the book we can find impressionism in the descriptions of nature. The Peasants is undoubtedly the greatest narrative achievement by the Polish author Władysław Reymont (1867–1925). The four volumes of the novel, titled after the four seasons, were serialized in a weekly magazine for nearly a decade and finally earned him the Nobel Prize in literature in 1924. The work’s originality stems from a detailed presentation of rural customs and characters. The story of the individual lives of a handful of families is combined with the cycle of death and rebirth of nature and Christian liturgy, elements that give the novel its unity and universality.Reymont decided to write about peasant life because of historical events, which took place in Polish villages in the early 20th century. The fact that the author was brought up in a village has a significant influence on the novel's plot. Significantly, the (genderless) narratorial voice comes from within the community, no doubt reflecting the fact that Reymont himself grew up in a village. Contrary to what might be expected, given that Polish society at the time was predominantly rural, there are few comparable Polish works: Bolesław Prus’ The Outpost (1885–1886), Eliza Orzeszkowa’s The Boor (1888) or Maria Dąbrowska’s Folk from Yonder (1926), all of which have themes in common with The Peasants, have an external, more objectivised narrative perspective. Reymont’s numerous and colourful characters provide ample intrigue and contribute to a great many subplots throughout the novel. Naturalism - a style of art or writing that shows people, things and experiences as they really are. In the book naturalism is used to present everyday life. The most famous fragment of the book when naturalism is shown is when Jakub – the farmhand - is cutting his leg. When Jagna finds herself caught between the conflicting desires of the village’s richest farmer, his eldest son and other leading men of the community, her resistance puts her on a tragic collision course with the community around her.