Poland suspense
1962
bw 94 min.
Director: Roman Polanski
CLV: $49.95 - available
           1 disc, catalog # CC1268L
VHS: available from Home Vision Cinema
Knife in the Water
started out as a straightforward thriller: a couple aboard a small yacht take on
a passenger who disappears in mysterious circumstances. From the first, the story
concerned the interplay of antagonistic personalities within a confined space.
Though stagey, the notion of isolating three people from the world lost its
theatricality when the setting was a sailboat. I wrote a short treatment and soon
signed a contract for my first film with Poland's Kamera [film production
unit].I didn't get very far with my first script collaborator, Kuba Goldberg.
Then Jerzy Skolimowski appeared on the scene. A university student, amateur boxer
and published poet, he was also a film school aspirant who happened to be
visiting Lodz Film School for the two-week entrance exam. At my suggestion he
took a look at what my previous collaborator and I had so far produced. Our duo
became a trio.
Skolimowski was a stimulating and inventive collaborator. He
snatched every moment he could spare to help me develop the screenplay, toiling
nonstop into the small hours while moths flew at us from out of the hot summer
night. His contribution to Knife in the Water was a major one. It was he
who insisted that the action, originally spread over three or four days, should
be compressed to twenty-four hours.
When the script was finished it was
submitted to the Ministry of Culture for approval. My expectations were at a
fever pitch -- pre-production had actually started -- when the board rejected it
on the ground that it lacked social commitment.
Some eighteen months later,
sensing the political climate had changed, I decided to try again with the
Ministry of Culture. I tinkered with a few scenes, adding some snippets of
dialogue designed to impart a trifle more "social commitment," and this time the
screenplay committee passed it for production.
Then I started casting. For the
middle-aged journalist husband I settled on an experienced stage actor named Leon
Niemczyk, who was handsome and slightly mannered in a way that suited the part. I
originally intended to play the young hitchhiker myself, but I was eventually
dissuaded. Any director making his first feature film was vulnerable to criticism
of all kinds, so combined responsibility for screenplay, direction, and one of
the three parts might lay me open to charges of egomania. Rather than court the
hostility of critics, I eventually picked Zygmunt Malanowicz, straight out of
drama school. Casting the journalist's wife proved more difficult: I decided to
look for a non-professional. On the strength of a screen test, I gave the part to
Jolanta Umecka, whom I spotted while prospecting at a municipal swimming pool in
Warsaw.
Second only in importance to cast and crew was the large houseboat that
became our floating home for several months in the summer of 1961. I insisted on
renting this in the knowledge that it would make for greater efficiency and
mobility while shooting, quite apart from being cheaper than score of hotel
rooms.
Even discounting wind, weather and the natural hazards of filming
afloat, Knife in the Water was a devilishly difficult picture to make. The
yacht was quite big enough to accommodate three actors but uncomfortably cramped
for the dozen-odd people behind the camera. When shooting aboard, we had to don
safety harnesses and hang over the side.
After all the hardship endured in the
making of my first film, the press showing was a disaster. The critics were
determined to pan it. The members of Poland's nomenklatura (communist
establishment) were starting to get rich quickly at this period, and Knife
was, among other things, an attack on privilege. Whether motivated by spite or
political zeal, most critics vociferously demanded to know what the film was
about. My "cosmopolitan" background was grist to their mill.
Despite its
rejection in Poland, Knife caused considerable stir elsewhere. It won the
coveted Critics' Prize at the 1962 Venice Film Festival. The following year, a
still from the film appeared on the cover of the September 20, 1963, issue of
Time. Better than that, it was nominated for an Oscar in the best foreign film
category.
-- ROMAN POLANSKI, from Mr. Polanski's 1984 autobiography,
Roman, published by William Morrow and
Company
Credits
Director: Roman Polanski
Producer: Stanislaw
Zylewicz
Screenplay: Jerzy Skolimowski, Roman Polanski, Jakub
Goldberg
Cinematographer: Jerzy Lipman
Music: Krzystoff
Komeda
Transfer
This edition of Knife in the Water was
transferred from a 35mm master print.