52 Films by Women Vol 9. 5. Przepiękne (Beautiful) (Director: Katia Priwieziencew)
Przepiękne (Beautiful), adapted from Karoline Herfurth’s 2022
German box-office hit Wunderschön
by writer Katia Sarnowska and
director Katia Priwieziencew is an interesting example of Polish commercial
cinema. Not only does it appear to be a faithful remake with a near-identical
advertising campaign – a poster in which members of the ensemble cast appear in
separate rectangles. It also illustrates Polish commercial cinema’s attitude
towards its citizens. The problem is not with the state nor with society. It is
with you. If only you stop being selfish, then life would be better. It is a
film without same sex love, ethnic tensions, even abject poverty. There are
relatable situations, art and pop culture references (Picasso, Dirty Dancing) but ultimately the extended, fragmented
family gets together and has a nice party. Don’t worry, the film says, we can
fix ourselves.
Wunderschön, which did not receive a commercial release
in the UK, was so successful that the actress-turned-director Herfurth released
a follow-up on 13 February 2025, just in time for Galentine’s Day, entitled,
naturally enough, Wunderschöner. It has proved almost as successful in
Germany, outperforming the most recent Bridget Jones film,
though at time of writing (26 April 2025) is coming to the end of its run.
Reading a review of Wunderschön, it is clear that Sarnowska and
Priwieziencew haven’t strayed very far from Herfurth’s source material, though
their film is twelve minutes shorter. Maybe you can say things more directly in
Polish than auf Deutsch. The film bounces between comedy, cutesiness and drama,
blending awkward romance, bulimia, the tension between motherhood and a career,
life after retirement, and the healing power of an orphan girl who sleeps in a
bin because she wants to know what her dead mother feels like. I don’t know whether
these tropes resonate for Polish audiences but there is some cut through. It
feels like a selection of films that you’ve seen before – Sweat and Shall We Dance, for example – as a mixtape. You empathise,
you groan, and so on.
The heavy-handedness
of the enterprise is evident from the opening scene, in which a young model, Julia
(Kamila Urzedowska) appears in a campaign for ‘natural looking’ women. The
punchline is that all the four women are young and thin with perfect skin, not
at all like the target audience. Julia regularly speaks to her phone (that is,
posting on Instagram), explaining that she has some great news (‘can’t wait to
share it’) and that eating is important, before spitting out a croissant. Elsewhere,
her mother, Krysia (Hanna Śleszyńska), who has recently retired from work,
attempts to give her sleeping husband, Wladek (Olaf Lubaszenko) a blow job
under the covers. He retreats from the marital bed in horror, tries to be
diplomatic (‘some other time’) and is more interested in food for his belly. In
their kitchen, Krysia stares at the wall. ‘It would be so nice is there was a
door,’ she says wistfully. ‘Not this again,’ groans Wladek. ‘It would be good
to look through,’ she adds. In another part of town, teacher and feminist,
Basia (Marta Ścisłowicz) sneaks out of an apartment after a one-night stand, on
her way to work. One assumes she has showered. Last night’s lover appears at
the balcony. She thanks him but is not interested in a second date. However, Basia’s
Audi car is not the best for making a quick getaway. It stalls. Throughout the
film, Basia is plagued by engine trouble and repeated encounters with Kuba
(Konrad Eleryk) who is first shown whistling at her. Glancing away from the
engine, Basia confronts him. ‘Perhaps you would like to have me spread on the
bonnet,’ she suggests. ‘I was whistling at the car,’ he explains,
unconvincingly. Basia is happy to see him leave, only he works at the school as
a fitness instructor; Basia can’t help running into him. Meanwhile, Basia’s
best friend, Magda (Marta Nieradkiewicz), also Krysia’s daughter-in-law, is
having difficulties dressing her young four-year-old, who won’t put on his
trousers. The new-born baby is also crying.
Maciek (Mikolaj Roznerski) steps in with a pair of scissors, turning
trousers into leggings so that the boy can look like a superhero, though I
don’t know any superheroes who appear to be wearing shorts. Maciek has just
been promoted, which means more time at the office. Magda responds by wanting
to return to work. In another part of the city, still, Julia’s agent, Agata (Katarzyna
Herman) pauses a meeting to take a blood test. She is experiencing the
menopause. Her ‘straight A' teenage daughter, Krystyna (Hanna Slesynska) attends
Basia’s class, which appears to address ‘body and spirit’. The class is invited
to describe their unique quality. Handsome and popular school jester, Patryk
(Hugo Tarres) draws a penis.
The film revolves
around these characters, introducing the wandering – and presumably school
dodging – orphan, Tosia (Roza Szmidt) whom Julia watches climb into a bin. (At
least Julia doesn’t look at her phone all time.) Julia pops downstairs to speak
to the girl, who is lying on top of a snug mound of cardboard. Tosia looks at
Julia as if she is a wounded animal; the young girl is the only one who ‘sees’
her. ‘Are you ill?’ she asks after she becomes a frequent visitor to Julia’s
apartment.
Quite apart from its attitude towards its characters, whose dilemmas can be fixed, the film scores some points through with attention to detail. Wladek wears a long-sleeved shirt with buttoned pockets but leaves the pockets undone. He’s a man who doesn’t want to make trouble for himself, having to open and close them for use. He accompanies Krysia to a tango class but participates in a sulk, watching glumly as the instructor takes Krysia’s hand. The tango is a respectful dance – bodies don’t touch – but relies on quick steps. Wladek sees the class as an embarrassment: why should he need to relight his romantic flame? We learn nothing else about him.
Julia’s apartment is
in a slightly run down part of town. Tellingly, the paintwork just beneath the
keyhole has been scratched off, as if Julia had spent many nights under the
influence of alcohol or worse trying to put the key in the lock and scratching
the door instead. We see her visit a chemist. ‘That’s a very complex
prescription,’ the pharmacist tells her. ‘I’m unwell,’ Julia replies before
returning home to inject herself. She appears not to have any friends, an
indictment of the modelling world where your colleagues are your competitors. Tosia
asks if she is a diabetic.
Basia’s choice of an
Audi car is also notable. A Polish woman driving a German vehicle, which after
all, Przepiękne is. How could it fail? Perhaps Kuba really
was whistling at the car – the ‘German [star] vehicle’ was a success for
Herfurth. Basia’s problem is her emotional cowardice, masked by feminism. Her
character is drawn in broad strokes – the farcical comic relief – avoiding Kuba
in scene after scene until she runs at him in a homage to Dirty Dancing. ‘You should warn me next time,’ he remarks
as both of them lie on the sports field. In the distance, Kuba’s students
cheer.
Pictured: A relationship just needs a little push. Basia (Marta Ścisłowicz) drives while Kuba (Konrad Eleryk) gives a helping hand in a scene from the Polish comedy-drama, 'Przepiękne!' (Beautiful), a remake of the 2022 film, 'Wunderschön', adapted by writer Katia Sarnowska and director by Katia Priwieziencew. Still courtesy of Magnetes Pictures/Warner Bros.
The film’s most interesting – and least resolved – subplot involves Krystyna, who is manipulated by Patryk. Krystyna has body image issues of her own, though she looks healthy. Nevertheless, she does not elicit the attention of any boy, even as she answers every question in Basia’s class, including describing the two women in a painting by Picasso as one woman, a woman looking at her own reflection that is in turn distorted, the reflection being slightly larger than the woman looking at it. (Or is it the other way around?) Patryk visits Krystyna’s house and is recognised by her mother, Agata. This after Patryk causes an accident and cleans up a mess. ‘How did you know where the vacuum cleaner was?’ Krystyna asks incredulously. Patryk is the cleaner’s son. We are immediately reminded of the plot of Sally Rooney’s Normal People, in which two people, one the son of a cleaner, begin a relationship. We can’t credit Herfurth with any originality. After he performs his class monologue describing what is unique about him – he puts on masks - Patryk later brags to his classmates how he trifled with Krystyna. She overhears and barges past him. In the park, Patryk tells her that he likes her, but he is profoundly disingenuous. After Krystyna leaves, a sage old man tells Patryk, in oblique terms, to reassess his behaviour. Because we only see Patryk from Krystyna’s point of view, we have no assurance that he has searched his soul.
What can Patryk say that will ever convince her that he is being sincere? The solution is art. He draws a set of pictures of Krystyna and presents them in class. The suggestion is that art is a way of portraying truth. Yet, in spite of Krystyna hanging one of Patryk’s pictures in her front room, we don’t sense that this will be a continuing relationship. As we know from all too many performers, art is no apology for appalling behaviour and lies. We can cite a certain writer-director with fifty films to his credit, the most recent being Coup de Chance. In any case, the picture is catalytic. What Krystyna really wants is to bond with her mother. They go to a children’s playground – two grown women on a tiny slide – to do just that.
The film includes a
classroom scene in which students are to draw themselves – red for the parts of
the body that they like, blue for the parts that they don’t. Reconciling ‘red’
and ‘blue’ has a greater resonance now than it has ever had, with ‘red’
representing Donald Trump’s autocracy and ‘blue’ democratic liberalism; red is
what we don’t like. Generally any classroom exercise that exposes weakness in
drawing is not a good thing and is bound to erode self-confidence. One wonders
how Basia is permitted to teach at all.
Magda and Maciek’s
subplot is the film’s least interesting strand, perhaps because the filmmakers
don’t really believe in it – a young woman abandoning her children for what, a
spreadsheet? We see Magda and Basia spy on Maciek who is talking to a woman outside
his office. Her dress has huge buttons on the side – the camera tilts from legs
to torso – and they are all fastened. The jealousy subplot is abandoned
quickly. Perhaps that’s the twelve minute difference between Wunderschön and the remake. Maciek brings the baby to his
father to look after. His mother is, we imagine, practicing a tango. Priwieziencew
cuts multiple times to the face of a cute, healthy baby, which provides the
audience with some gratification. Looking at her post-birth belly, Magda
contemplates surgery, in spite of the fact the family appears to have money
problems.
There is an event
that brings the family to its senses. Krysia discovers that flirtation on the
dance floor is no substitute for family. Julia, having been fed spaghetti and
sugar by Tosia, before expelling it, addresses her own condition, after cutting
her hair and collapsing during a shoot. Were it not for Tosia, things could
have gone even more badly. This in spite of the casual sex and walking on the
city’s tramlines.
Pictured (from left to right): Maciek (Mikolaj Roznerski), Magda (Marta Nieradkiewicz), Krysia (Hanna Śleszyńska) and Wladek (Olaf Lubaszenko) in a scene from the Polish comedy-drama, 'Przepiękne!' (Beautiful), a remake of the 2022 film, 'Wunderschön', adapted by writer Katia Sarnowska and director by Katia Priwieziencew. Still courtesy of Magnetes Pictures/Warner Bros.
The characters have
to commit to the thing they’re most afraid of – knocking down a wall, planning
a schedule, eating food, embracing a relationship – to live better. These are
all broadly within the characters control. This may explain the success of
Herfurth’s film and the desire to remake it. As we know in life there is plenty
not in our control. Przepiękne
plays on the myth of total
agency as if governmental checks and balances will take care of the rest. In
2025 of all years, that is a very dangerous myth to propagate.
Reviewed at Cineworld Wood Green, Screen One, North London, Thursday 24 April 2025, 19:00 screening
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