Kościuszko po Racławicami (partially found polish silent film; 1913)

Picture from the film.

Status: Partially found

Kościuszko pod Racławicami (Kościuszko at Racławice) is a Polish film from 1913, based on a drama of the same title by Władysław Ludwik Anczyc. The film was directed and starred an unknown filmmaker called Orland.

Realisation

By the standards of the time, the film was made on a grand scale - about 2000 extras took part, most scenes were shot on location (in towns near Lviv: Zimna Woda, Brzuchowice and Hołosko), and the budget was quite high. Despite this, the film was not a success. In 1927, after some changes, the film was released again, but under a different title: Bitwa pod Racławicami (The Battle of Racławice).

Availability

In 2009, fragments of a copy of the film, made in 1927, were found in a private house in Kraków. The two rolls of 35mm tape found are about 450m long (the whole film was originally 1600m long) and the duration of the fragments is about 20 minutes. The owner of the house gave the tapes to the National Film Archive, where, thanks to the work of Renata Wąsowska and Professor Małgorzata Hendrykowska, the title of the film was established. The found film is one of the oldest films in the National Film Archive's collection, after Kultura Pruska (Prussian Culture) from 1907 or 1908 and Meir Ezofowicz from 1911.

External Links

• Kościuszko pod Racławicami on filmpolski.pl.