A Short Film About Killing

Even more pointed in its message than the Oscar-winning drama Dead Man Walking, Krzysztof Kieslowski's 1988 A Short Film About Killing is quite possibly the most powerful anti-death-penalty film ever made. It's also one of the most disturbing, since Kieslowski--the late, great Polish director of The Double Life of Veronique and the Red/White/Blue trilogy, among others--crafted this unforgettable drama (expanded from a shorter version in Kieslowski's acclaimed miniseries The Decalogue [VL-9/03]) with an emphasis on atmosphere, grim and grimy, achieved through the use of dark filters and a decrepit vision of Warsaw rotting at its core. In this bleak landscape a morose drifter kills a misanthropic cab driver (the killing--reportedly the longest in cinema history, at seven minutes--is almost unbearable to watch), and the rest of the film focuses on the scheduled execution of the killer and the anguish of the lawyer assigned to plead his case. The two killings--one murder, or two?--are treated as symptoms of a sick, decaying society, one killing just as abhorrent as the other. Boasting a sharp image and solid sound, DVD bonus features include numerous interviews with Kieslowski's colleagues and collaborators, as well as the director's 1997 documentary featurette “A Night Porter's Point of View.” Recommended. [Note: Kieslowski's 1988 A Short Film About Love is also newly available on DVD.] (J. Shannon)