The Peasants (2023 film)

The Peasants (2023 film)
The Peasants is a 2023 adult animated historical drama film directed and written by DK Welchman and Hugh Welchman. An adaptation of Władysław Reymont's Nobel Prize-winning novel of the same name, the film was produced using the painted animation technique, similar to Loving Vincent. The film stars an ensemble cast which includes Kamila Urzędowska, Robert Gulaczyk, Mirosław Baka, Sonia Mietielica, Ewa Kasprzyk, Cezary Łukaszewicz, Małgorzata Kożuchowska, Sonia Bohosiewicz, Dorota Stalińska, Andrzej Konopka, Marcin Rusin and Maciej Musiał. It is a co-production between Poland, Serbia and Lithuania.
The world premiere took place at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Plot
The movie, like Reymont's novel, is divided into four parts corresponding to each of the four seasons. It takes place at the turn of the twentieth century, over the course of one year, in the village of Lipce.
Autumn. A beautiful, yet modest, young peasant Jagna Paczesiówna, with a talent for creating cutouts, is in love with Antek Boryna, the son of the richest peasant in the village, Maciej Boryna. However, Antek has a wife, Hanka, who has a hard time accepting her husband's advancements towards another woman. In addition, Maciej, who is a widower looking for a new wife, decides to marry Jagna and give her six acres of land as a dowry. Antek and Hanka disapprove of this decision. After the fight between Antek and Maciej the family's senior orders his son and daughter-in-law to leave the farm.
Winter. Jagna, athought married to Maciej Boryna, 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.
Spring. Maciej, lying wounded on the bed, secretly hands Hanka hidden money to provide food for her family. Meanwhile, Jagna gets an offer from mayor Piotr to help free Antek from arrest. However, the mayor takes advantage of the situation, getting her drunk and unsuccesfully trying to rape her. One day, Maciej instinctively gets up from the bed in order to sow his field, but collapses and dies during sowing. Antek returns from arrest and takes over his father's property. Antek, noticing Jagna during the carolers' visit, lures and rapes her.
Summer. Jagna, now with a reputation of a promiscuous woman, rejects the offer to marry a carpenter named Mateusz out of spite. The residents of Lipce discuss the matter of Jagna and decide to banish her from the village. Antek, who is now Lipce's most influential person, allows the peasants to carry out a lynch. Outraged, they attack the hut where Jagna is hiding, tear off her clothes and take her to the edge of the village. There they beat and throw dirt at her, leaving her naked in the rain. After some time, the humiliated Jagna gets up, washes her face and runs off.
Cast
Kamila Urzędowska as Jagna
Robert Gulaczyk as Antek Boryna
Mirosław Baka as Maciej Boryna
Sonia Mietielica as Hanka Borynowa
Ewa Kasprzyk as Dominikowa
Cyprian Grabowski as Witek
Cezary Łukaszewicz as Michał, Maciej Boryna's son in law
Małgorzata Kożuchowska as The Organist's Wife
Sonia Bohosiewicz as The Mayor's Wife
Dorota Stalińska as Jagustynka
Andrzej Konopka as The Mayor
Mateusz Rusin as Mateusz
Maciej Musiał as Jasio
Production
The film was produced using the painted animation technique over the production of five years, similar to the Welchman duo's previous film, Loving Vincent. Initially the film was shot with the actors, and then more than a hundred painters in four studios in Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine, and Serbia painted oil paintings based on the shots, which became frames in the film. Animators then worked to supplement the paintings to make the whole film seamless. The artists spent over 200,000 hours in total working on the project.
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. Józef Chełmoński's works used in a film include the following:
The film is a co-production by BreakThru Films in Poland, Art Shot in Lithuania, and Digitalkraft in Serbia)
Music
The score is by Łukasz Rostkowski (aka "L.U.C."), a Polish MC, rapper, activist, and music producer based in Wrocław. As founder of the international Rebel Babel Ensemble (aka Rebel Babel Film Orchestra), he has created a "Multimedia concert" with Rebel Babel for the film. The score will be released on November 3, 2023.
2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine impact
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.
From October 2022, another wave of bombings and associated power cuts began in Ukraine. However, the painters wanted to continue to create, and arranged their schedule to the rhythm of the power cuts, waiting in the cold when that electricity was out. In late autumn, BreakThru Films launched a campaign on a crowdfunding website to urgently raise funds to purchase a power generator that would restore the artists' ability to work.
Release
The world premiere took place at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 13, 2023, in the Special Presentations section. It was also invited at the 28th Busan International Film Festival in 'Flash Forward' section and was screened on 8 October 2023.
The film was released in Polish cinemas on October 13, 2023 by distributor Next Film.
, the film had been sold to over 40 countries. In September 2023, Sony Pictures Classics acquired distribution rights to the film for North and Latin America, the Middle East, Australia and New Zealand.
Reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 78% based on 9 reviews, with an average rating of 7.8/10. Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 84 out of 100, based on 6 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".
In Poland the movie has enjoyed a critical acclaim. On the review aggregator Mediakrytyk, which uses a weighted average, film holds rating of 8.1 based on 32 reviews, indicating "very positively rated and approved by the critics".
Box office in Poland
With over 141,000 admissions The Peasants recorded the biggest opening weekend for a Polish film in 2023, dethroning Agnieszka Holland's Green Border. After 12 days of release, the distributor Next Film has reported that the number of admissions passed 500,000. By 30 October 2023 the number of recorded admissions rose to above 750,000 making the movie the most popular Polish release of 2023.
Accolades
References
External links
2023 films
2023 animated films
2023 drama films
Polish historical films
Polish animated films
2020s Polish-language films
Animated historical films
Polish historical romance films
Polish historical drama films
Serbian historical drama films
Serbian romance films
Serbian animated films
Lithuanian drama films
2020s historical drama films
Adult animated films
Works based on art
Animated films set in the 1900s
Films set in Poland
Animated films set in Europe
Sony Pictures Classics animated films