We are living in an age of intolerance. The ‘other’ is made into an object onto which those with fear in their minds and hate in their hearts can project their fevered prejudices.
Do those who populate the populist and neo-fascist parties of today’s Europe ever pause to consider how those they profess to hate feel about living as foreigners in an alien culture? Probably not. But Indian-born film director and long-term resident of #Warsaw Arjun Talwar offers a way to experience the world in another’s shoes.
Tragic genesis
Talwar, a fluent Polish speaker who came to Poland to attend the famous Lodz Film School, falls into his subject – the simple everyday life on the street where he lives in an old district of Warsaw, where his courtyard still bears the scars of World War Two battles – almost by accident. Grieving the death by #suicide of a close friend who had emigrated along with him to Poland, he tries to understand what may have brought him to this tragic end by reaching out of his own ex-patriot bubble into the lives of his neighbours.
Despite its tragic genesis, Letters from Wolf Street – a kilometre-long stretch that was once part of the lands of a Polish aristocrat named Wolf — is a lyrical and gently comic introduction to the idiosyncrasies of the Polish character as seen by a foreigner.
Local characters
As we gradually meet the local characters, starting with the lady who works at the meat counter at the store, lamenting that fewer and fewer young people live on the street, Arjun finds one ‘local’ to tie the stories together: Piotr (Pan Piotr to his customers) the postman. He literally ties the street together, bringing not only post but company to the many elderly and lonely people living in apartments in the street’s tall tenements. Piotr is a cheerful character with a keen insight into Polish history and temperament. Arjun – who is also cameraman and (until Mo, a Chinese friend from film school days, meets him by chance) sound technician – makes good use of Piotr, involving him in some of the more ingenious visual stunts, such as measuring the width of the street with a long tape measure when the traffic is light.
Giving people the time and opportunity to share their own ideas about Polish culture and the extent to which foreigners are welcomed (or not) pays off. People have a natural intelligence when it comes to gauging a culture’s balance, and these insights are truly valuable. This reveals a Poland that is less #xenophobic than media reports usually allow.
Closer to the people
As the film waxes and wanes through the seasons – plenty of snow and wintry showers here – Arjun joins the ultranationalist section of an Independence Day march (even though he had only a few years ago been beaten up by skinheads), asking participants what makes a good immigrant. «Work hard and integrate,» the more reasonable answer.
He may have some fellow immigrant friends, but the process of making the film – accompanied by a fine soundtrack – brings Arjun closer to people. Making friends with a Polish #Roma man, who cheerfully declares they are relatives as the Roma have roots in #India, Arjun experiences his world opening up.
Letters From Wolf Street is a testament to what can materialise when people simply communicate and allow themselves to see and be seen.
