Night Train (1959 film)

Night Train
Directed by	Jerzy Kawalerowicz
Written by	Jerzy Kawalerowicz Jerzy Lutowski
Starring	Lucyna Winnicka Leon Niemczyk
Music by	Andrzej Trzaskowski
Cinematography	Jan Laskowski
Editing by	Wieslawa Otocka
Distributed by	Telepix
Release date(s)	September 6, 1959 (1959-09-06)
Running time	93 minutes
Country	Poland
Language	Polish

Night Train (also known as Baltic Express) is the English title for Pociąg, a 1959 film directed by Jerzy Kawalerowicz.

Plot

Two strangers, Jerzy (Leon Niemczyk) and Marta (Lucyna Winnicka), accidentally end up holding tickets for the same sleeping chamber on an overnight train to the Baltic Sea coast. Also on board is Marta's spurned lover, who will not leave her alone. When the police enter the train in search of a murderer on the lam, rumors fly and everything seems to point toward one of the main characters as the culprit.

Critical Response

This is a more amorphous and ambiguous tale than other contemporary films of the Polish School, and Night Train seems to lack the direct references to recent history and the contemporary political situation of the Poland of the 1950s that are a hallmark of the style. However, the Hitchcockian atmosphere, the unimaginably tight shots and the overall sense of claustrophobia and dread evoke the sense of disappointment following in the wake of 1956 and the end of the 'Polish Spring'. All of Kawalerowicz’s films deal with individual fate in a society being crushed by overwhelming external forces, whether war or politics, in an attempt to examine moral choice under pressure. Night Train is no exception, only here he has created an allegory of misfits among a society of passengers, a society that is predictable, suspicious of individuality, and eager to punish. All of Poland escaping though the night to the end of the line. Ironically, the film may represent in its way the end of the Polish School as well.

2009 Remake

Night Train was recreated in 2009 by Brian King, who both wrote and directed it. Night Train (2009 film) stars Danny Glover (Lethal Weapon, Death at a Funeral), Leelee Sobieski (The Wicker Man, Public Enemies), and Steve Zahn (Daddy Daycare, A Perfect Getaway).

See also

• Cinema of Poland
• List of Polish language films

External links

• Night Train at the Internet Movie Database