Rejs, known in English as The Cruise (or The Trip Down the River), is a Polish

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

 comedy

Comedy

Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...

 film released in 1970, directed by Marek Piwowski

Marek Piwowski

Marek Piwowski – Polish director and scenarist.-Filmography:* Rejs – 1970* Korkociąg - 1972* Przepraszam, czy tu biją? – 1976* Uprowadzenie Agaty – 1993* Oskar – 2005-Awards:...

 who also co-wrote the screenplay

Screenplay

A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

 with Janusz Głowacki. The score was composed by Wojciech Kilar

Wojciech Kilar

Wojciech Kilar ; b. 17 July 1932 in Lwów, Poland) is a Polish classical and film music composer.-Biography:Wojciech Kilar is one of Poland’s esteemed composers. Born in 1932 in Lwów . His father was a gynecologist and his mother was a theater actress...

.

Rejs is considered as a masterpiece by many and as the earliest cult film

Cult film

A cult film, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a highly devoted but specific group of fans. Often, cult movies have failed to achieve fame outside the small fanbases; however, there have been exceptions that have managed to gain fame among mainstream audiences...

 in Polish cinema

Cinema of Poland

The history of cinema in Poland is almost as long as history of cinematography, and it has universal achievements, even though Polish movies tend to be less commercially available than movies from several other European nations....

. Shot in a quasi-documentary style, with a cast featuring not more than two or three professional actors, the absurd plot parodies life in the People's Republic of Poland

People's Republic of Poland

The People's Republic of Poland was the official name of Poland from 1952 to 1990. Although the Soviet Union took control of the country immediately after the liberation from Nazi Germany in 1944, the name of the state was not changed until eight years later...

, reducing a weekend river cruise to a hilarious parody of the entire communist system.

A stowaway (Stanisław Tym) sneaks aboard a ship departing on a cruise down the Vistula

Vistula

The Vistula is the longest and the most important river in Poland, at 1,047 km in length. The watershed area of the Vistula is , of which lies within Poland ....

 River. The captain takes him for a Communist Party

Communist party

A political party described as a Communist party includes those that advocate the application of the social principles of communism through a communist form of government...

 cultural coordinator and the intruder gladly adapts to his new role, immediately setting to work at manipulating the passengers and crew into silly and vaguely humiliating games. Before long, Tym has got everyone under his thumb and created his own comedic dictatorship. A memorable performance was given by Jan Himilsbach, an amateur actor who formerly carved tombstones.

Quotes

• ...but what voting system can be used to select the method of voting?
• ...it's time for actions, not words. Now let me speak.

External links

• Official website (Polish)
• Poster gallery