Filming Akcja Wisla

Anna Rydzanyč

Original Rusyn versions of this article appeared in the 6/2003 issue of Besida and in the 1/2 2004 issue of Rusyn.

The screenplay for the film “Akcyja Visla” was written in 1996. Its author, Lemko Association head Andrij Kopča, intended it to be a monument in film dedicated to the people who survived the titular forced deportation from the mountains to the north and west of Poland in 1947. The first attempt to make the film was made in 1996 and 1997. Lack of funding and flooding in Lower Silesia forced the idea onto the shelf for another five years.

But in July 2002, the filmmakers were able to shoot most of the necessary footage in Lemkovyna, in the picturesque villages of Zyndranova, Kunkova and Liščyny. By August 2002, though, it was clear that there wasn’t enough money and that there was no way to complete the film. The project was shelved once again, but this time for just one more year.

8 July 2003, Bortne

The village of Bortne is noted in modern Lemko culture as the site of the most wonderful Vatra festivals. In the second half of the 1980s, journalists praised it as the Lemko Mecca. The village is made up of all of about 50 buildings. There is an Orthodox church, a shop. A bus links Bortne to the nearest village.

The scenes of the 1947 deportation are to be filmed here. Most of the scenes will be composed of archival footage, but not all. Early in the morning, locals gather with the film crew at the Greek Catholic church of SS. Cosmos and Damian (built in 1842, today it is a museum). They have carts full of their possessions. The locals are extras, playing the deportees. The performances of some of them are authentic, as they some of the locals are seemingly transported back into their own histories.

Attention turns to a short, sun-burnt man in a black jacket and a wide-brimmed hat. A horse-drawn cart enters the shot. Leško Koltko from the neighboring village of Bodaka does not remember these events. He was born in 1952 in the far-off Zielonogorskie province of Poland but returned to Lemkovyna with his parents in 1958. Today, he is playing the role of a homeowner who loses his village.

Just like years before, a bus arrives from Legnica. The scene features three generations: grandfathers, sons and grandchildren. The elder Lemkos compare their memories to the reenactment they are supposed to perform.

“Back then, the carts were full of more things, the featherbeds are missing,” says an older woman.

“Only horses and cows?” an older man marvels. “They deported us with goats and sheep too.”

Somewhere before noon, from a little hill in front of the church the director calls out:

“Lights! Camera! Action!”

Sebastyjan Vojtarovič, a graduate student at the Katowice film academy, starts filming. In the small valley in front of the church there are carts surrounded by crying women. Small children are sitting in the carts. Trying to convince the children that they have to be sad is no easy task. Little by little, they get into character and hang their heads low. Soldiers surround the deportees. The next scene features red cows which represent those that the Lemkos once tended. They are also slightly inauthentic, thanks to the shining rings in their ears.

As it turns out, Bortne is familiar to American filmmakers as well. Several decades ago, scenes for a Polish-American coproduction, “And the Musicians Stopped Playing,” were shot here. That film was about Roma who died during World War II. Osyf Madzik, who is here for the shooting and who has headed up the church museum since 1966, was an extra in that film.

“As compared with that film, this production seems more modest,” he says.

All present believes that something unique is being born here, since no one else has made a feature film about Akcyja Visla before.

9 July 2003, Bortne

Cold and rainy, today does not look promising. A scene is to be shot in which a wedding party leaves a church under the barrels of rifles. Under the threat of a downpour, they have to rush the scene. People are taking cover under the eaves of the belltower. The camera is ready for action, but no order comes.

“Five minutes are turning into an eternity,” says Osyf Madzik. The group emerges from the church, and the Kostjakiv family is drenched in the rain. The priest says goodbye to the newlyweds, and the others walk along the river. Everyone is overcome with sorrow as they return home to get ready for deportation.

11 July 2003, Zyndranova

Today is supposed to be the final day of shooting on “Akcyja Visla.” After years of struggle, the team can see the light at the end of the tunnel. But everything will depend on finding the last bit of funding. Late afternoon/early evening filming is planned at Zyndranova. All they need is one small shot and two more scenes. Here work on the film began one year ago, and it is here where we hope it will happily conclude.

On the road from Gorlyce to Zyndranova, the director and the cameraman look for a place which is reminiscent of an old Lemko village. This is no easy task, since today there are power lines everywhere and the houses have all been modernized.

“That world is now lost,” the director thinks aloud.

Then Rafal Zjentara, the sound engineer, remembers working on documentary material about the writer Andrzej Stasiak at the Zyndranova open-air architectural museum.

We go past Dukla, just 14 kilometers further, and we visit Mr. Fedor Goč, at the museum. Nothing here has changed. The houses are the same, the windmill shines in the afternoon sun.

“This is the place,” smiles Rafal.

It is calm here now, since there are no tourists in the museum.

In stark silence, a lieutenant runs out with a pistol from around the corner of one house. Andrij Kopča is playing the role of the villain himself, since, as he says, he loves such roles. Then having heard the shots, he runs into the house of an old woman refusing to be deported. One more shot and that is that.

Now it is after midnight. The cameraman turns off his camera. That last scene was a “duel” of wits between the mother and the officer, in which he tries to talk her into leaving the house. The scene was already shot the year before, but the director was not satisfied and it had to be redone. This was the first scene filmed for “Akcyja Visla,” and it was the last one filmed as well.

Once post-production is completed, we will be anxiously waiting for the premier.