The Polish-language title, Pokot, is a hunting term that refers to the count of wild animals killed. The English title Spoor refers to the traces and tracks left behind by the hunted game.
Plot
The film is set in a remote mountainous region of the Kłodzko Valley in south-western Poland, where an eccentric elderly woman, Janina Duszejko, lives with her two dogs. Her dogs disappear one day while she is giving a local woman, nicknamed Dobra Nowina, a ride to the store. She confronts her neighbour who she calls "Big Foot", a notorious poacher in whose traps animals die in agony. One night she is awakened by Matoga, another neighbour, who informs her that Big Foot is dead. Duszejko is questioned by the local police chief, to whom she makes complaints about her missing dogs which he dismisses. After seeing Duszejko, the police chief meets with Wnetrzak, a local businessman, who gives the chief an ultimatum about money the chief owes him. Duszejko complains to the local priest about the loss of her dogs but she is chastised for being blasphemous to treat animals like humans. Disturbed by the local hunting activity and the killing of animals in the area, she attempts to interrupt a local hunt but is stopped and humiliated by Wnetrzak.
In the winter, she and Dyzio, an IT expert working for the police, see the police chief's abandoned vehicle at night and discover the chief's body nearby. He is dead from a blow to the head and there are animal tracks near the body. Questioned about the body by the prosecutor, who is Matoga's son, she talks about the tracks she found and her theory of astrology. The prosecutor dismisses her theories. Duszejko befriends Dyzio and Dobra Nowina, who now works for Wnetrzak in a shop by day and in a brothel that Wnetrzak runs by night. Dyzio is thankful to Duszejko for keeping his epilepsy a secret or else he would lose his job. Dobra Nowina has a younger brother who is being abused by their father and has attempted to gain custody of him but learns that Wnetrzak has reported her as unfit twice. Later Duszejko discovers the body of a young boar and attempts to report an off-season killing of the animal but is laughed off by the police.
In the summer, Duszejko meets a Czech entomologist, Boros Schneider, in the forest. He has discovered Wnetrzak's body which has been in the forest for months and reports it to the police. Duszejko and Boros begin a romantic relationship and Boros explains to her about pheromones that attract certain beetles. Duszejko is questioned by the prosecutor about Wnetrzak's death. She proffers a theory that the victims were killed by animals since they were all hunters. Dobra Nowina is arrested for Wnetrzak's death, because of threats she made against him. With Matoga, Duszejko goes to a costumed ball attended by all the locals. She sees the drunken mayor Wolski abusing his wife, telling her to wait in the car while he continues his partying. Duszejko comforts the wife and tells her to go home and that she will look after Wolski and make sure he gets home.
The next day police show up at her place and arrest her for Wolski's death, because she was the last one to see the mayor alive. She says that she did go to look for the mayor that evening and, since nobody knew where he was, assumed someone else took him home. She then explains her theory of astrology to the police who get flustered at her and release her. She attends a church service and, very upset by the priest's sermon which gives thanks to the hunters, is removed from the church. While outside the church, she sees a magpie carrying an object to the church tower (earlier she had said magpies start fires by carrying lighted cigarette butts to their nests).
Duszejko then has a flashback about the death of the police chief. She was the one who killed the police chief by striking him on the head when she accidentally came upon him while skiing. After making animal tracks around the body, she rushed home and attempted to flee but her vehicle would not start. There is another flashback where she lures Wnetrzak to the forest using a ruse about money she had found and she strikes him on the head until he dies, after which she goes to his fox farm and releases all the animals.
Dyzio, who is with Dobra Nowina, recalls that the mayor's body was covered with beetles and that Duszejko would carry pheromones that attracted the beetles. Dyzio then reasons that Duszejko was responsible for all the deaths. When Dyzio learns that the church is on fire and the priest is dead, he goes with Dobra Nowina to see Matoga and finds him sitting with Duszejko at her kitchen table. They hand Dobra Nowina a photo which shows all the local hunters displaying the spoils of a hunt, which included Duszejko's two dogs. Duszejko said she found the photo at Big Foot's place after his death. Duszejko then recounts the death of the mayor, who she found alone and very drunk after the party. She confronted him about shooting her dogs and he admitted it but said he didn't know they were her dogs. She tells him to drink the pheromones she had with her and then walks him into the forest under the guise of taking him home.
Matoga, Dyzio and Dobra Nowina decide they will help Duszejko and manage to sneak her out of town. The police are on to Duszejko and are out in full force in an attempt to arrest her. Dyzio uses his IT skills to cut the power to the town, which allows them to escape. In the final scene, Duszejko with two new dogs, Matoga, Dyzio, Dobra Nowina, Dobra Nowina's little brother and Boros are all having lunch happily at a house in what is probably a neighbouring country.
Discussion with Holland at the premiere of Spoor (Pokot) in Nowa Ruda, south-western Poland
On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 74% based on 42 reviews, and an average rating of 6.8/10.[9] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 61 out of 100, based on 6 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[10]
In a feature in Film Comment, Amy Taubin praised the film's political critique and its beauty, stating, “Sprawling, wildly beautiful, emotionally enveloping, Spoor earns its vision of utopia. It would not be the most resonant and inspiring political film of the century if it did not give us hope.”[11][12]
In a positive review for the Krakow Post Giuseppe Sedia wrote, "enriched with some majestic close-ups of wild animals caught in their natural habitat and framed à la Sergei Parajanov, Holland’s film is a sturdy environmental thriller film drenched in a very Czech black humor that could charm trappers and mushroom hunters alike".[13]
In February 2017, director Holland said in an interview for The Guardian: "One journalist for the Polish news agency wrote that we had made a deeply anti-Christian film that promoted eco-terrorism. We read that with some satisfaction and we are thinking of putting it on the promotional posters, because it will encourage people who might otherwise not have bothered to come and see it."[14]
The history of cinema in Poland is almost as long as the history of cinematography, and it has universally recognized achievements, even though Polish films tend to be less commercially available than films from several other European nations.
Agnieszka Holland is a Polish film and television director and screenwriter, best known for her political contributions to Polish cinema. She began her career as an assistant to directors Krzysztof Zanussi and Andrzej Wajda, and emigrated to France shortly before the 1981 imposition of the martial law in Poland.
Brigitte Roüan is a French director, screenwriter and actress.
Man of Marble is a 1977 Polish film directed by Andrzej Wajda. It chronicles the fall from grace of a fictional heroic Polish bricklayer, Mateusz Birkut, who became the Stakhanovite symbol of an over-achieving worker, in Nowa Huta, a new socialist city near Kraków. Agnieszka, played by Krystyna Janda in her first role, is a young filmmaker who is making her diploma film on Birkut, whose whereabouts seem to have been lost two decades later. The title refers to the propagandist marble statues made in Birkut's image.
They Only Kill Their Masters is a 1972 American mystery film directed by James Goldstone, written by Lane Slate, and starring James Garner and Katharine Ross, with a supporting cast featuring Hal Holbrook, June Allyson, Tom Ewell, Peter Lawford, Edmond O'Brien, and Arthur O'Connell. The title refers to Doberman dogs that might have been responsible for a woman's murder currently under investigation by the local police chief (Garner).
Katarzyna Herman is a Polish actress, who appeared in more than 70 television and film productions.
New Amsterdam is an American television drama which aired for eight episodes in 2008 on Fox. The series starred Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as "John Amsterdam", an immortal Dutch man born in 1607, who has lived in New York City on and off since he was 14 years old, and who 'partners' with a female homicide detective in the present day. The series was nominated for an Emmy for Main Title Design.
Nights and Days is a 1975 Polish film directed by Jerzy Antczak. This epic family drama was based on Maria Dąbrowska's novel Noce i dnie, and was described by The Washington Post as "Poland's Gone With the Wind". Set in Kalisz and the Kalisz Region in the second half of the 19th century after the failure of the January Uprising in 1863, the film presents a unique portrait of an oppressed society, life in exile, and the confiscation of private property as told through the loves and struggles of the Niechcic family. This sweeping historical epic was the highest-grossing film in Poland's history upon its release and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1977. The film score was composed by Waldemar Kazanecki, which includes a Viennese waltz that is frequently played at Polish weddings as the first dance of bride and groom.
The Beast of Bladenboro refers to a creature responsible for a string of deaths amongst Bladenboro, North Carolina animals in the winter of 1953–54. According to witnesses and trackers, it was likely a wildcat species, but its identity was ultimately not definitively confirmed. According to reports, the animal commonly crushed or decapitated its victims, which were mostly dogs.
In Darkness is a dual-perspective 2011 Polish drama film written by David F. Shamoon and directed by Agnieszka Holland. It was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 84th Academy Awards.
Dogs is a 1977 American natural horror film directed by Burt Brinckerhoff about a pack of dogs that go on a killing spree.
The Lure is a 2015 Polish musical horror film directed by Agnieszka Smoczyńska. It tells the story of two sirens who emerge from the waters and perform in a nightclub. One falls in love with a man, and gives up her tail, but loses her voice in the process. The story is a reworking of the 1837 fairy tale "The Little Mermaid" by Hans Christian Andersen, with inspiration from Smoczyńska's experiences. After a Polish premiere, the film screened at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival and Fantasia Film Festival to positive reviews.
The 67th annual Berlin International Film Festival was held from 9 to 18 February 2017 with Dutch filmmaker Paul Verhoeven as president of the jury.
On Body and Soul is a 2017 Hungarian drama film written and directed by Ildikó Enyedi. The story revolves around the CFO of a slaughterhouse and the newly appointed meat quality inspector who discover they can communicate with each other through their dreams, leading to an unlikely romance. It won the Golden Bear in the main competition section of the 67th Berlin International Film Festival. At Berlin it also won the FIPRESCI Prize and the Prize of the Ecumenical Jury. It was selected as the Hungarian entry for the Best Foreign Language Film and was nominated at the 90th Academy Awards. Alexandra Borbély won the European Actress award at the European Film Awards for her performance in the film.
Honeygiver Among the Dogs is a 2016 Bhutanese mystery film directed by Dechen Roder. It was screened in the Panorama section of the 67th Berlin International Film Festival.
Patrycja Volny is Polish actress known for her role as Dobra Nowina in the 2017 crime film Spoor, the Polish entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 90th Academy Awards. She first appeared in 2012 legal drama television series True Law. She is the only daughter of the late Polish singer and songwriter Jacek Kaczmarski.
Agnieszka Mandat is a Polish actress. Her film credits include Spoor and Zwerbowana milosc. Her television credits include The Crown and the Kings and Nad rozlewiskiem....
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead is a 2009 mystery novel by Olga Tokarczuk. Originally published in Polish by Wydawnictwo Literackie, it was later translated to English by Antonia Lloyd-Jones and published in 2018 by the British independent publisher Fitzcarraldo Editions. The book received a wider release in 2019 when it was published in the United States by Riverhead Books on 13 August 2019. A portion of the English translation was originally published in literary magazine Granta in 2017.
Charlatan is a 2020 Czech-Polish-Irish-Slovak drama directed by Agnieszka Holland based loosely on the healer Jan Mikolášek (1889–1973), who cured hundreds of people using plant-based remedies. It was selected as the Czech entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 93rd Academy Awards making the February shortlist. It won five awards including Best Film at the 2021 Czech Lion Awards.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
