Winter of the Crow

Glasnost hadn't quite got to General Jaruzelski's Poland, even if Lech Walesa's "Solidarity" movement was already shaking the communist regime by 1981. That's where the slightly aloof psychology professor "Andrews" (Lesley Manville) is headed to give a lecture at a university. Barely has she started her presentation, though, when it is hijacked by some protesting students - and that's just the start of her unexpected exposure to a rebellion in which her host/interpreter "Alina" (Zofia Wichlacz) is heavily involved. What now ensues sees her come to some fairly stark realisations about the brutality and oppressiveness of the regime and encounter some dangers of her own all whilst, sadly, serendipity takes an increasingly unlikely role in the proceedings. Manville delivers steadily, but there is something increasingly implausible about the direction this story takes as she finds herself stuck in a frozen city with no common language and only some Polaroid photos that she took, harmlessly, from her first few hours in Warsaw. The plot just lacks for substance and the whole thing could have done with more depth to it's characters and, indeed, just a little more context for those of us who don't keep carp in the bath. For me, this couldn't quite decide if it wanted to be more of a fictitious John le Carré style of tense political drama or a documentary depicting the relative poverty of a population living under a decaying communist jackboot, and try as she did Manville just hadn't enough to work with to sustain this. There are elements of menace here, but the closing stages rather confusingly let things down. It's worth a look, but I'm afraid that it does disappoint.