Lava

On the eve of the Day of the Dead, among the old and mysterious rituals of the Vilnius region, ghosts of the past and of the present begin to appear. The film rests on a well known play of Polish literature and, rather than staging the text, carries it into the present. The account mixes its layers of time; people from different periods are found in the same place. National memory, captivity and resistance stand just below the surface. The film was made in 1989, on the edge of a great political change in Poland. The rituals themselves form the backbone of the account. Its scenes are dark and lit by candle. Gustaw Holoubek plays the lead in Tadeusz Konwicki’s hundred and twenty nine minute Polish film, completed in 1989.