Directed by: Wiktor Bojanowski
Starring: Nel Kaczmarek, Angelika Smyrgała, Tomasz Schuchardt, Mikołaj Matczak
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Microbudget film program has worked like a wonder in recent years to support young directors to make their first feature film in Poland. That’s how it was possible to produce films such as Tomasz Habowski’s Songs About Love and Kamil Krawczycki’s Elephant that were then showcased in the low-budget sidebar of the Gdynia Film Festival. This time it was the turn of Wiktor “Korek” Bojanowski who put together Utrata równowagi (Loss of Balance), a cost-affordable film set in the milieu of a fictitious drama school in Warsaw.
A seasoned man of the theatre, Jacek (Tomasz Schuchardt), is assigned to a group of close-knit acting students that pick out Macbeth as the last play before graduation. On a personal level, working with young actors is also a chance for Jacek to restore his professional reputation following an accusation of mobbing. Is he really ready to revise his mentally exhausting and somehow manipulative approach to coaching?
Jacek suggests to record on the rehearsals preserve evidence that can refute any allegation after the controversy he has been tied to. Privacy is a human right actors should be ready to forfeit. Nonetheless, at least the constant presence of a camera helps to put some distance between us, the audience, and the characters including Maja (Nel Kaczmarek) and Anka (Angelika Smyrgała) — they are both vying for the role of Lady Macbeth.
While in Loss of Balance the topics of misconduct and harassment in the workplace are put in the narrative forefront, Bojanowski’s film is also a coming of age, and on stage, story about young actors who will have to struggle to stay active in this sector after becoming professional. Perhaps the ‘damned spot’ evoked in Lady Macbeth famous hand-washing monologue, which is rehearsed over and over again by Maja through the film, is like an invisible stain that any real performer should preserve at any cost to sparkle on stage.
Loss of Balance was favourably received in Gdynia and Bojanowski received the Janusz Morgenstern “Perspective” Award for Best Newcomer Director, among other accolades. A pre-release screening of the film was held on April 13th 2025 at the Pod Baranami Cinema in Krakow
Film Reviewed by Giuseppe Sedia
Published by Kino Mania on April 18, 2025