Pitbull. Niebezpieczne kobiety – film review

Went yesterday to nearby cinema to do myself a birthday treat, or in other words a debraining experience I yearned for after the recent heartquake.

The film is a sequel of Pitbull. Nowe Porządki which went to the silver screen in January 2016 and which I admit to have watched it less than two months ago on YT (legally as I was not sharing the content), prompted by a friend. The case of Pitbull. Niebezpieczne kobiety is a rare example of a sequel beating the original story. Nevertheless, you should not expect much from the film directed by Patryk Vega, whose moving pictures have never been favourably reviewed by critics, but have wide audience who fancy the job he does.

The film could boast of record-high audience over the weekend it premiered. Over the first three days on big screen it was watched by 768 thousand cinema-visitors, until now the audience count reached 2.4 million. Over the first two weeks cinema rooms were reported to be chock full of people, a phenomenon I have not witnessed for ages. Even while watching Wołyń the weekend it premiered, though there were more than 100 people in the auditorium, by no means crowds were pushing in.

According to critics and anonymous authors of online reviews, the plot is the film’s weakest point. I would argue given the theme of the blockbuster there was little room to get a better effect and I notice improvement in comparison to Pitbull. Nowe porządki. Nevertheless I share many watchers’ view the plot is hard to follow and you need to read a lot between the lines to make out why some scenes come after others.

So you might wonder what drew in millions of Poles to cinemas to see this very film. I suppose the response is that Poles are fond of a fine blend of dirt. The ingredients are: coarse sex scenes (sometimes resembling porn films), foul language and violence in abundance. Besides when the plot is set around the thin line dividing the forces of good (police) and evil (mobsters trading in fuel and wheedling out VAT refunds). The film is claimed to be inspired by actual stories, but I resist to even wonder whether meanderings of life of criminals and policemen chasing them have been depicted accurately.

The blockbuster, slated by many, yet watched by many, many more is not an outstanding piece of film art. It stands no chance of going down in the history of Polish cinematography, as Psy have done. Quotes from it, though funny and at times bright and quaint are unlikely to become cult. But if are at a loose end around Christmas and not expect an ambitious film, two and a half hours (including advertisements before) spent in a cinema will not be a waste of time.

Actually for many years I had not been fond of film-watching. For no apparent reason my attitude towards trips to a cinema has changed recently. Sitting in cosy chair in a dark room for some two hours takes you cuts you off from the imperfect outer world and lets you submerge in a totally different reality. After a series of trailers watched yesterday I know which two Polish films I will definitely watch in the first quarter of 2017.

Escape room

This sort of collective entertainment has become popular in Poland pretty recently. I have first heard of it in the summer 2015 and back then there were quite a few such facilities in Warsaw; since then several new escape rooms have sprung up and you need to book a room several days in advance if you want to go there on most popular time slots (Thursday / Friday evenings or during weekends).

The very concept is well-explained in the dedicated wikipedia article (funnily enough, there is no Polish version as of today). It is essentially a battle of wits with the forces that lock you up, so participants need to use their brains to crack several logical puzzles to break out of the locked room. Usually the game has a specific theme around which puzzles revolve. Players need to get to grips with the brainteasers within an allotted time. They win if they manage to find a key to the door before this time runs out.

I ventured to such place on Friday evening with my workmates. Such game is said to enhance teamwork skills, yet we went there off our own bat (and paid for it from our own pockets), not being ordered by The New Factory. The facility we visited was located on the third floor of a tenement in the very heart of Warsaw and was a spacious flat redesigned into three escape rooms and an accompanying office. One needs to invest a bit to create this and I estimate the entry costs at some 2 million PLN, assuming a flat is purchased (I cannot imagine a landlord giving tenant a free rein to build an escape room in their property); running costs is what I find harder to estimate. Plus to attract new clients the business-keeper should bring in new themes from time to time… The facility we went had just one significant drawback, namely it lacked air-conditioning, which in the summer season might be a nuisance, when a few persons are locked in a tiny space with area less than 20 square metres.

Most clients of such facilities are companies which send their staff to escape rooms as part of team-building programmes or just to expend integration budgets. The cost is not exorbitant. We had a discount voucher from a workmate who once had been to the same facility, but to a different room and we filled the room with maximum number of participants and ended up with expense per head below 20 PLN, while an average rate you can expect is around 30 – 40 PLN per person, still a sum which will not break the bank.

Though neither enchanted by the game, nor fascinated by it, I will eagerly repeat it in a while and recommend you also try it out with your family, friends, colleagues or whoever you want to enjoy time with.

After the hour of fun and short sit-down at a café I stroll towards the dance school along the crowded streets of the central part of Warsaw. Compared to how it looked like a decade ago, social life in the centre of Warsaw is thriving. Glad to see more and more people lap up the most beautiful part of the year outdoors. In this respects we are catching up with our Western Neighbours who socialise instead of clamming up indoors.

Dance class

September. Nagging heatwaves have gone by for good. Nights are drawing in. Time to break out of the lethargy in which I plunged just after the exam and in which I lingered over nearly the entire summer. Time to focus on less mundane stuff than floating between home and work with some occasional only entertainment.

Nearly three years of swotting up for three levels of the examinations have worn me down and put off learning for a while. My idea to refresh my command of German, lost on account of not using it (I was reminded of it specifically painfully last year while holidaying in Germany), has been given up. Firstly, I did not feel like taking up another course, doing homeworks, etc. Secondly, signing up for a language course would require attending classes twice a week either early in the morning or in the evening, which for work-related reasons (the New Factory requires more and more flexibility in terms of business trips and staying overtime) could not be viable, or on Saturday mornings, which in turn does not come into play for family-related reasons.

A new pastime activity was meant to involve some sort of physical exercise, so eventually I have plumped for dance classes. So far I have had two lessons and absolutely do not regret my decision!

Definitely it is never too late to learn something new and useful. While attending parties and weddings I was never chair-ridden, but I danced as good as I could (just as many people do). But why dance as you can, while it is better to “can dance” (pun intended, yet sounds silly, unlike the Polish lepiej umieć tańczyć, niż tańczyć jak się umie). My selection was the party dance course (taniec użytkowy) – not complicated, yet most coming in handy on social occasions.

Before signing up I had some doubts whether I was up to it. My sense of rhythm is below-average, yet my co-ordination of movements of limbs must not be bad if I drive a car at absolute ease, so I hoped I would not bugger up all along.

After two classes the impressions I can share are the following:

- as long as the pace of learning is moderate and an instructor does not try to teach you too much, grasping the dance comes up naturally,

- switching the partners continuously adds much value to the learning, since you do not learn how your partner moves, but develop universal habits and learn how to send and receive impulses to and from your partner,

- dancing not only enhances your daily routine but also helps you forget about the quandaries of the daily grind,

- it is essentially the chance to meet new people and simply have fun!, but

- unlike some of you may think, odds of finding there a life companion are statistically and practically low (in my group those people who do not come with a partner, have been sent by their partners to brush up on their dancing skills).

There was a time people urged to take a dance class to find a girlfriend. When they gave up on urging, I settled for it on my own! The sound approach, I believe, is to go there for any other reason than to find a girlfriend. Otherwise, I would have ended up frustrated!

And once the current course draws to a close, I will sign up for another one, just to have fun!

Speechless, all of a sudden

Stand-up comedy is still a niche type of entertainment in Poland. Polish audience, used to low-brow cabaret programmes shot repeatedly on TV, would probably find it as a challenge to embrace as demanding performance as stand-up is. Despite this, stand-up turns out to thrive in Poland, although you should not expect to watch it on TV or hear about it in commercial radio. Fans of this comic style will nonetheless find it easy and inexpensive to buy tickets for live performances of stand-up comedians…

I have learnt it all since for some reason I did a research on stand-up in Poland. While doing this self-assigned task, I also decided to find out who the most prominent stand-up comedians in Poland are…

Uncle Google always helps in such instances and the search engine did the job without reproach. Only my jaw dropped open at the sight of outcomes. I kept opening each next search result and my mouth refused to shut…

Recall the Short story about the price of trust? I have totally put the hapless loan out of my mind and with hindsight had to read over all my postings labelled lent 1,000 to refresh my memories of how I had been duped by my middle-school classmate. Karol, as it turns out, is one of the up-and-coming stand-up comedians in Poland. Back when we were in our teens he exhibited inclination and talent for stage career. His first performances available on youtube are from 2011 when he would show off his skills during open mic sessions. At that time, according to blog records (keeping some stuff for posterity now pays off) he underwent gambling rehab therapy and did his sentence for unpaid debts. As the (alleged?) sentence was suspended and partly swapped for public works, one does not conflict with the other. Internet contains some evidence of his 2012 performances, but his stand-up career began to speed up in 2014. These days probably everyone familiar with stand-up in Poland knows his (real) name. He is not one of most famous comics, however critics and more experienced fellow stand-up comedians claim he is one the most promising young artists, has his unique, individual style and huge potential to grow into an outstanding stand-up comedian. Nothing more about, since I still do not want to reveal his identity.

The reading also reminded me Karol had borrowed money, much more money, from our fellow classmate, Marek. Without further ado I logged on to fejsbuk to find Marek is online and I started off a chat. Marek’s jaw probably also dropped open at the news of our ex-friend being a rising star of stand-up comedy. Sadly, Marek did not recover full 8,000 PLN he had lent. Having been paid off 6,000 PLN and having wrangled too much to get back the remainder (it would require taking the case to the court, as some of Karol’s creditors did), he had given it a rest. Interestingly, Marek knew a bit more about Karol’s tribulations than I did. Up to that moment, I had only been stunned, from that moment I was incensed. I could get over he had deceived me and many of his other former friends, but I cannot get over Karol turning his back on his family who got financially and emotionally ruined getting him out of troubles several times, despite this being none of my businesses, I feel damn sorry for Karol’s parents and brother.

I do not wish badly on anyone, including Karol. As Marek rightly said, maybe it is better he pursues his career as comedian than if he was to engage in massive scams as a lawyer (he had been expelled from the Faculty of Law for embezzlement of money from the student union’s account). But if once he rises to stardom and I happen to see him on TV, I will look at him with disdain and contempt. A man of honour might stumble and fall, but once a man of honour mends his ways, he makes up for the wrong he did. Karol, as the Internet shows, has got up of his knees, but does not think about apologising to his primary-school friends, middle-school friends, high-school friends and university friends (all of whom he still owes money). He will remain in their bad books so maybe his efforts to fix once broken friendships should be spared. Yet, first and foremost he should beg his family for forgiveness. Based on what I know, he has cut off, they renounced him and therefore even if for many he will be a celebrity, for me he will remain a liar and a thief.