Eva Hoffman

A film made in a style of street ballad is a directing debut by Tadeusz Chmielewski. It is also the first film for Barbara Kwiatkowska, then a seventeen year old winner of the contest which attracted thousands of girls from Poland. The film depicts the adventures of an innocent farm girl who comes to the city a day before the new school year starts. A janitor does not let her in the dormitory and Eve is left without overnight accommodation. She meets a friendly policeman and then becomes involved in surreal events, involving unusual figures such as: policemen, thieves and prostitutes.

As the Holocaust recedes from us in time, the guardianship of its legacy is being passed on from its survivors and witnesses to the generation after. How should we, in turn, convey its knowledge to others? What are the effects of a traumatic past on its inheritors, and the second generation's responsibilities to its received memories?

Portrait of a City in Two Acts: Lviv, Then and Now

A compelling new picture of one of the most important, complex, and misunderstood figures of our time.