Dan Conley

I assume a good deal of time has passed from the trial to this day, the day of Miroslaw’s execution. It begins with Piotr entering the prison ground through an iron gate. He seems shocked at the sounds of the heavy metal doors closing behind him. Next he is

After the horrors of the last segment, Kieslowski quiets things down considerably here. It begins with the head judge in Miroslaw’s case saying that court is adjourned. We see Piotr, downcast, wearing his Polish judicial robe. Miroslaw asks him if they are finished. As Miroslaw is escorted out of

One of the reasons why I enjoy Kieslowski films is that he examines serious issues without resorting to the violent trappings of contemporary cinema. These days it doesn’t seem like a film is taken seriously unless it has a fair share of brutal violence. Kieslowski always stood opposed to

One interpretation of episode 5 is that harsh punishment not only doesn’t deter the worst instincts of humanity, in some cases it might encourage it. The argument is that people carrying around a deep sense of guilt over behavior that was allowed to slide without consequence are driven to

I mentioned in the last essay that Episode 5 looks like nothing else in The Dekalog. There are a couple of reasons for this. First, when Kieslowski was finding the funds for The Dekalog, he played a little trick on the Polish arts funding apparatus. He applied through normal government

Dekalog 5 is the most famous episode in the series, in part because Kieslowski expanded upon it in his feature film “A Short Film About Killing.” It’s his most distinctive looking episode, shot in a completely unique high-contrast style that looks nothing like anything else in Kieslowski’s body