REVIEWS

A well-intentioned but ultimately flat portrait of a remarkable survivor

Certificate: 15 Director: Maciej Barczewski Cast: Piotr Glowacki, Rafal Zawierucha, Marcin Czarnik Released: Out now

Tadeusz ‘Teddy’ Pietrzykowski, a bantamweight-class fighter, had a promising future ahead of him as a pugilist. In 1937, he was successful enough to be crowned Warsaw Champion. Two calamities then unfolded: a career-wrecking injury and the invasion of Poland by the Wehrmacht, sparking World War II. As a patriot, Pietrzykowski signed up and fought in the Siege of Warsaw. Making his way to France after the German army claimed victory, he was captured in Hungary and turned over to the Nazis. In the hands of the Gestapo, the former boxer was tortured, interrogated and sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau as part of the first mass transport. There, he became known as Prisoner #77.

Over the course of two years, before his eventual transfer to another camp in early 1943, Pietrzykowski but that is almost 60 years old and the angle of this particular version is that it’s been made in Poland, his homeland.