Demon (2015 film)
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Pawel Maślona
Marcin Wrona
Agnieszka Żulewska
Tomasz Schuchardt
Andrzej Grabowski
Adam Woronowicz
| Demon | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Marcin Wrona |
| Written by | Marcin Wrona Pawel Maślona |
| Produced by | Olga Szymańska Marcin Wrona |
| Starring | Itay Tiran Agnieszka Żulewska Tomasz Schuchardt Andrzej Grabowski Adam Woronowicz |
| Cinematography | Pawel Flis |
| Edited by | Piotr Kmiecik |
| Music by | Marcin Macuk Krzysztof Penderecki |
Production companies | Lava Films Wajda Studio Silesia Film Israel Film Fund Transfax Film Productions Kraków Małopolska Kraków Region Krakow Regional Film Fund Chimney Telewizja Polska Polish Film Institute Magnet Man Film The Orchard |
| Distributed by | The Orchard |
Release dates |
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Running time | 94 minutes |
| Countries | Poland Israel |
| Languages | Polish English Yiddish |
Demon is a 2015 Polish supernatural psychological horror film produced, written and directed by Marcin Wrona. It was shown in the Vanguard section of the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival.[1] It was Wrona's last feature film, as he died by suicide on 19 September 2015 while promoting the film at the Gdynia Film Festival.[2]
Polish Briton Piotr (Itay Tiran), who has been living and working in England for many years, and Żaneta (Agnieszka Żulewska), a Polish lady, are to be married; they had met only over the Internet, but he knew her brother. Piotr speaks Polish awkwardly, remembering more from his ancestors than from personal experience. He moves into a run-down large rural estate previously owned by Żaneta's grandfather.
While digging in the yard with a backhoe right before the wedding, Piotr finds a skeleton, which at first he keeps quiet about. He is increasingly haunted by the vision of a woman in a wedding dress – Hana. During the wedding reception this vision draws closer and closer to him, and he has apparent seizures. He is eventually possessed by Hana, the woman in the dress. Żaneta's family is well-to-do, and they want to keep his breakdown quiet from the rest of the wedding guests, so they distract their guests with vodka and loud music while locking Piotr in the basement, first with a doctor, then a priest. Finally, the teacher (Włodzimierz Press), who appears to be the only surviving Jewish resident of the town pre-war, realizes that Piotr is speaking Yiddish, and that he is possessed by the spirit of Hana, a lovely Jewish girl he knew before the war who suddenly disappeared.
The film is a re-telling of a classic dybbuk story and also an allegory for Polish-Jewish relations before and after the war. It is implied that Żaneta's grandfather may have gotten rich in part by "possessing" this property once its former Jewish residents were gone.
Cast
- Itay Tiran as Piotr "Pyton"
- Agnieszka Żulewska as Żaneta
- Tomasz Schuchardt as "Jasny"
- Andrzej Grabowski as Żaneta's father
- Tomasz Ziętek as Ronaldo
- Katarzyna Gniewkowska as Gabryjelska
- Maria Debska as Hana
- Adam Woronowicz as doctor
- Włodzimierz Press as professor
- Cezary Kosiński as priest
