ATKK-ZMŁ-I-040

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 opens with images of factory halls, the faces of women after the night shift, and the increasing noise of the machines, and then moves to the crowds in front of the employment office and the blood donation station, where conversations about earning extra money are recorded. Subsequent sections are devoted to the desire to possess: the faces of people staring at displays with televisions, furs, and gourmet baskets, sales of cheap clothing, the lottery announcement, and the queues at the bazaar. Further parts present images of poor, overcrowded apartments, ruins of tenements and renovations contrasted with the optimistic commentary of the announcer about “meeting the plan”. as well as scenes involving alcohol, children’s games in courtyards, city traffic with the “grandmother with a flag” directing trams, Sunday events in the park, the car market, a street race, and May Day propaganda contrasted with a May outing by the pond in Arturówek.