When Hollywood sets out to portray alcoholics, you get something sanitary like "Days of Wine and Roses" or happy endings like "Arthur". This is European realism and you get to see all the puke, soiled underwear, bar fights and street urination of real alcoholics. I don't know if the actors have alcohol problems in real life but each one is perfect in telling their story and how low "the mighty angel" has brought them in life. Robert Wieckiewicz is particularly perfect as a ruined Jerzy. Compare his performance to a half-smiling Jack Lemmon (Days of Wine and Roses) or the women alcoholics to cutsie-poo Lee Remick (also Days of Wine and Roses).

And what better country to make a movie on alcoholism than Poland? During the Soviet era in Poland, one of the few commercial successes was Palmos (the state liquor monopoly). Although the Soviets are long gone, alcoholism still persists in present day Poland. It will take a long time for Polish society to grapple with the problem. Let us hope this movie takes the glamor out of the bottle for the Polish people. I think that is what the end of the movie symbolizes. We see Jerzy just out of rehab standing in the middle of a street equidistant from a bar, liquor store and the safety of his apartment. Just like present day Poland.