Spring 2021—Thursday, April 8
I Never Cry
Jak Najdalej Stąd
Poland, Ireland, 2020, 98 minutes
Directed and written by: Piotr Domalewski
Principal Cast: Zofia Stafiej (Ola), Kinga Prejs, Arkadiusz Jakubik, Dawid Tulej, Nigel O’Neill
Description
Domalewski’s film tackles the subject of mass economic emigration that started after Poland joined the European Union. Thousands, if not millions, of families were separated: kids grew up without their parent or parents. The film’s protagonist, seventeen-year-old Ola, is one of these kids. When her father dies in a construction accident in Ireland, she must leave her mother and disabled brother behind in Poland to retrieve his body. With only a backpack and a dwindling pack of cigarettes, she bounces around Dublin, doing her best to thwart the different levels of bureaucracy. However, what matters most to her is to check whether her father had actually set aside the money for a car he had promised her. It is only during this journey that she realizes that what she has really dreamt of was not a car but a relationship with her father. The performance by first-time actress Stafiej is powerful and impressive.