ATKK-ZMŁ-I-026

Typescript with the screenplay for Krzysztof Kieślowski’s film “From the City of Łódź” (1969). The film presents an impressionistic portrait of Łódź – a city of textile industry and social and architectural contrasts – shot with cinematography by Janusz Kreczmański, Piotr Kwiatkowski, and Stanisław Niedbalski. Before the film received its final title, work on it proceeded under the working titles “The People of Łódź” and “The City of Łódź”. The document is divided into numbered sequences (1-10). They describe successive observational blocks: the faces of women workers after the night shift, the car market and bazaars, scenes of collecting water from a tanker and from public street wells, a meeting at the Department of Municipal Affairs, and images of Łódź’s rivers. In later sections there appear, among other things, the “grandmother with a flag” directing trams, queues at the train station and for taxis, an ambulance making its way through the congested city, a blood donation point, themes related to alcoholism, children playing in courtyards, Sunday events in the park, a speedway match, as well as housing and registration problems juxtaposed with preparations for the May Day parade and a May outing in Arturówek. The screenplay takes the form of a detailed, dialogue-free observational description that organizes the structure and themes of the film.