He compares cinema to a turtle, because it’s easier to write a novel than to make a film- and he knows both forms of art well. He adds: ‘What is significant in cinema is the recognition of constant processes existing irrespective of who possesses the power, the recognition of some kind of a nation’s though processes. Only then can this turtle-like process of creating a film be less important.” The profile of the director from A to Z… wrong, to T.

A: ‘Aria for an Athlete’ (1979) – a debut film, one of the mostly awarded Bajon’s films; received 10 distinctions. The diary entitled ‘On the rings of the world’ [Na ringach świata], written by the Polish wrestling world champion Zbyszek Cygankiewicz, was a loose basis for the script. Krzysztof Majchrzak played the role of Góralewicz, a boxer

C: ‘Cień za dniem’- his autobiographical novel published in 2008


D: Dom – Film Studio, managed by Bajon; the producer of some of his films, e.g. ‘It’s better to be beautiful and rich’ (1993) and ‘Poznań 56’ (1996)


E: Extreme in each scene- it’s The director’s motto. He says that “a film has to be blown up, it has to show the world we’ve never seen”, hence the extreme way of presenting extreme scenes


F: Fellini from Poznań – a label adhered due to his fascination with the works of the Italian director. Born in Poznań, Bajon is often compared to this filmmaker due to his wanton visual imagination


H: Humor- favourite kind: the Czech cinema


I: Ingenuity – this is what he is interested in in cinema; ‘I’m fascinated with the creation of the world from the beginning, with inventing it- in other words, its dramaturgical function”

L: Law – he graduated from the Faculty of Law and Administration at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań

Ł: Łódź – he graduated from the Łódź Film School in 1974; since 2008 he is the dean of the Directing Department at that school

M: „Maiden Vows” – his latest film; we’re waiting … and waiting … and waiting for its premiere


P: ‘Polar bears do not like sunny weather’- Bajon’s debut novel, written at the age of 24; awarded the prestigious Wilhelm Mach Award. Later he published short stories ‘Let’s go upstairs’ [Proszę ze mną na górę] (1979), novels ‘A series entitled’ [Serial pod tytułem] and ‘A bug’ [Podsłuch] (1994)


S: Scripts – he is the author of all his films’ scripts (except for the script of ‘Une Petite Vie Tranquille’) and the script and dialogues to Piotr Andrejew’s ‘Klinch’(1979)


T: „The Shilly–Shally Pendulum” – Bajon’s feature film that achieved a meta-level: a documentary film was made about it by Grzegorz Jankowski and Jacek Szczerba (‘Systemic diseases. About The Shilly-Shally Pendulum’, 1999)


Jagoda Janowska