Leave No Traces

2021 [POLISH]

Action / Crime / Drama / History

4
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Certified Fresh 62% · 13 reviews
IMDb Rating 7.1/10 10 2342 2.3K

based on a true story police based on true story beaten to death 1980s communist regime

Plot summary

In 1983, communist Poland is shaken by the case of high school student Grzegorz Przemyk, who is beaten to death by police. The only witness of the beating becomes the number one enemy of the state.

Director

Jan P. Matuszynski Photo
Jan P. Matuszynski

Top cast

Robert Wieckiewicz Photo
Robert Wieckiewicz as General Czeslaw Kiszczak
Tomasz Zietek Photo
Tomasz Zietek as Jurek Popiel
Agnieszka Grochowska Photo
Agnieszka Grochowska as Grazyna Popiel
Tomasz Kot Photo
Tomasz Kot as Kowalczyk
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay
1.44 GB
1280*534
Polish 2.0
NR
Subtitles pl   us  
24 fps
2 hr 40 min
Seeds 2
2.95 GB
1920*800
Polish 5.1
NR
Subtitles pl   us  
24 fps
2 hr 40 min
Seeds 4

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by d_lankhorst 9 / 10

Gripping from start to finish

Reviewed by tehWuer 5 / 10

People's Poland as in the picture, but in a poorly constructed script

Who contributed to the death of Grzegorz's high school graduate: the policemen against whom the only witness of the beating at the police station testifies, colleague Jurek Popiel or the ambulance crew transporting the wounded and suffering boy to a hospital in communist Poland, right after the abolition of the martial law in 1983? The government on an unprecedented scale unleashes the action of refuting the accusations that its services were involved in the death of a young man, discredits Jurek, manipulates the police investigation, controls the actions of the prosecutor's office and does everything to blame emergency service paramedics.The course of this process of deception, deception, harassment, fabricating false evidence, influencing by any means to change the testimonies of witnesses (shaping the environment, intimidation) is a fascinating lesson in the recent history - totalitarian power in the countries of real communism and is the central part of the picture that occupies the most.The remaining parts raise doubts about the overly extensive multithreading of the plot, and on the other hand, the school, even junior high school logic in the conduct of the action, especially the investigation by the policemen to conclusions as simple as a flail pattern. Exaggerated meticulousness in conducting many narratives does not inspire a positive image, which means that the film lasts almost three hours and the selection of the cast quite wrongly (Sandra Korzeniak as Barbara Sadowska, overhauled and without a shadow of emotion, Aleksandra Konieczna - extraordinarily charging as prosecutor Wieslawa Bardon, Tomasz Dedek - general Wojciech Jaruzelski, Robert Wieckiewicz as general Kiszczak, both playing caricatured characters like puppets or from a wax figures cabinet, Sebastian Pawlak as a medic Wysocki - his psychological reactions are unbelievable, although the leading roles of Tomasz Zietek (as Jurek Popiel) and Jacek Braciak - Tadeusz, Jurek's father, plus at least correct and fit as usual: Tomasz Kot and Agnieszka Grochowska. The lack of twists, suspensions, and other basic instruments in constructing contemporary entertainment cinema is striking.For the sake of balance, the scenography (Pawel Jarzebski - stage designer and Malgorzata Zacharska responsible for the costumes) deserves exceptional approval for detail fidelity, which is meticulous and carefully recreating the realities of the Polish People's Republic of the first half of the 1980s.
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