REEEC Master Calendar

Slavic Dept Lecture: "PRL Noir: Specters of Communism in Contemporary Polish Cinema"

Event Type: Lecture
Sponsor: Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures; Department of Comparative and World Literature; the Russian, East European, and Eurasian Center; and the European Union Center
Location: 2090B LCLB
Date: Oct 13, 2025 5:00 pm
Speaker: Łukasz Wodzynski (Assistant Professor, Department of German, Nordic, and Slavic, University of Wisconsin-Madison)
Cost: Free and open to the public
Contact: David Cooper
E-Mail: dlcoop@illinois.edu
Views: 8
Originating Calendar: Russian, E. European & Eurasian Center: Co-sponsored Events; In his presentation, Prof. Wodzynski defines and examines the phenomenon of “PRL Noir”: a series of tele-cinematic returns to Poland’s socialist period (PRL standing for “People’s Republic of Poland”) that channel present-day anxieties over communism’s grim legacy through the highly stylized medium of crime drama. What makes these Polish productions distinct among the current wave of “global noir” films and television series? Can film noir—and crime drama more broadly—serve as a medium for cultural memory? Does “the specter of communism” still haunt East-Central Europe?