The Last Family

I like Polish cinema, but I didn't like The Last Family at all. Tragic stories usually move me, but the film's treatment of the fate of the Beksiński family is coldly emotionless most of the time. My feelings are so contradictory that I cannot rate it better than three stars. However, the final title song blew me away, and I would easily give it five stars. (60%) (05/11/2021)

One big carousel of all kinds of emotions, with the darker ones definitely predominating. And yet, paradoxically, I haven't laughed at a film like this in a long time, the black humour is flawless. For a better experience, I recommend not looking up anything about the Beksinski family, this is one of those films that you think how amazing and terrible it is at the same time, and you won't be able to get it out of your head for a few days. The soundtrack is brilliant, likewise with the casting, the actors perfectly resemble the real people. And then the whole handling of the passing years – I haven't seen such elaborate details in a long time. (12/05/2017)

I biopic about famous Polish painter Zdzisław Beksińsky (I realised I knew some of his paintings without knowing the author’s name) that doesn’t look at all like a biopic. By that I mean that not even once it looks as if the filmmakers had limited themselves to reality – to what actually happened. It’s a clearly and confidently executed author’s vision that says a lot about a lot, and to do that it only needs to focus on one not entirely happy (yeah, it’s an euphemism) Polish family throughout three decades. The strongest début of the year, and there’s no question about it. Congratulations Poland! Why can’t this happen here? (11/02/2017)

A comedy show of (ab) normal Polish family or in other words a movie that evokes and leaves a feeling for which there is no exact name, something between indescribable sadness, disarming truth, sincere joy, unspoken between the lines, existential loneliness, claustrophobic block of apartment genius loci, voyeur depressive tragicomedy, and elusive beauty of all this. Strong words, a strong movie and a redefinition of the biographical genre as such. Beksinski's disturbing surrealist images do not address this, and yet it says it all. It gets stuck under the skin in a way that will calm down only by indifferent observation of the night sky, when lit one cigarette after another. No matter you have never smoked before. It is beyond my comprehension where the above come from in such a young (and debuting!) creator. Just... Congratulations. (10/02/2017)

It’s been a long time I’ve felt such a lingering silence throughout the entire cinema after the final scene. I didn’t say a word, I just stared blankly at the screen, thinking about the tragic family story that I had just watched. And even though I knew where it was going halfway through the movie already, it never occurred to me that it would end the way it did. The whole movie stunned me even more once I looked up Zdzisław Beksiński on the internet. And I also recommend you to google him afterwards, for an even better movie experience. It is perfect filmmaking that slowly gets under the viewer’s skin with heavy characters, none of whom are lovable, but each of whom have their upsides and their downsides which you end up pondering all the time. But I think that I can’t recall a similar movie. When you’re surprised by a movie that you knew nothing about and it tells a story about someone that you knew nothing about, be sure that it’ll be as stunned as I was. The Swiss artist Giger once said that Zdzislaw’s paintings were something he had never seen in his life.I believe that it’s the same with this movie. I have never had a similar movie experience. Hats off to the 3Kino movie festival for bringing such a strong story to life. I’m speechless… (06/11/2016)