The Decalogue (TV series)

The Decalogue
DVD box set cover
Directed by	Krzysztof Kieślowski
Produced by	Ryszard Chutkowski
Written by	Krzysztof Kieślowski Krzysztof Piesiewicz
Starring	Artur Barciś see below
Music by	Zbigniew Preisner
Cinematography	Wieslaw Zdort Piotr Sobociński
Edited by	Ewa Smal
Production company	Sender Freies Berlin (SFB) Telewizja Polska (TVP)
Distributed by	Warner Bros. (Poland)
Release dates	10 December 1989 (1989-12-10)
Running time	572 minutes
Country	Poland
Language	Polish
Budget	$100,000 (all parts)
Box office	$447,093

The Decalogue (Polish: Dekalog, pronounced [dɛˈkalɔk]) is a 1989 Polish television drama series directed by Krzysztof Kieślowski and co-written by Kieślowski with Krzysztof Piesiewicz, with music by Zbigniew Preisner. It consists of ten one-hour films, inspired by the Ten Commandments. Each short film explores one or several moral or ethical issues faced by characters living in an austere apartment block in modern Poland.

The series is Kieślowski's most acclaimed work, has been said to be "the best dramatic work ever done specifically for television" and has won numerous international awards, though it was not widely released outside Europe until the late 1990s. Filmmaker Stanley Kubrick wrote an admiring foreword to the published screenplay in 1991.

Production

Though each film is independent, most of them share the same setting (a large housing project in Warsaw), and some of the characters are acquainted with each other. The large cast includes both famous actors and unknowns, many of whom Kieślowski also used in his other films. Typically for Kieślowski, the tone of most of the films is melancholic, except for the final one, which, like Three Colors: White, is a black comedy, and features two of the same actors, Jerzy Stuhr and Zbigniew Zamachowski.

The series was conceived when Krzysztof Piesiewicz, who had seen a 15th-century artwork illustrating the Commandments in scenes from that time period, suggested the idea of a modern equivalent. Krzysztof Kieślowski was interested in the philosophical challenge and also wanted to use the series as a portrait of the hardships of Polish society, while deliberately avoiding the political issues he had depicted in earlier films. He originally meant to hire ten different directors, but decided to direct the films himself, though using a different cinematographer for each with exception of episodes III and IX, both of which used Piotr Sobociński as director of photography.

Themes

The ten films are titled simply by number (e.g. Decalogue: One). According to Roger Ebert's introduction to the DVD set, Kieślowski said that the films did not correspond exactly to the commandments, and never used their names himself.

The themes of The Decalogue can be interpreted in many different ways; however, each film has its own literality:

Commandment (Roman Catholic Enumeration)	Ideal	Kieślowskian Theme
I am the Lord thy God... thou shalt not have other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image... Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them.	The sanctity of God and worship	Idolization of science
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.	The sanctity of speech	Names as fundamental to identify and moral choice; the importance of one's word in human life.
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.	The sanctity of time	Time designations (holidays, day/night etc.) as repositories of meaning
Honor thy father and thy mother.	The sanctity of authority	Familial and social relationship as regulators of identity
Thou shalt not kill.	The sanctity of life	Murder and Punishment
Thou shalt not commit adultery.	The sanctity of love	The nature and relation of love and passion
Thou shalt not steal.	The sanctity of dominion	Possession as human need and temptation
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.	The sanctity of truth	The difficulties of truth amid desperate evil
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife.	The sanctity of contentment	Sex, jealousy, and faithfulness
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods.	The sanctity of contentment	Greed and relationships

Episodes

Episode	Cast	Cinematography
Decalogue I	Henryk Baranowski Wojciech Klata Maja Komorowska	Wieslaw Zdort
Decalogue II	Krystyna Janda Aleksander Bardini Olgierd Łukaszewicz	Edward Klosinski
Decalogue III	Daniel Olbrychski Maria Pakulnis Joanna Szczepowska	Piotr Sobociński
Decalogue IV	Adrianna Biedrzyńska Janusz Gajos Adam Hanuszkiewicz	Krzysztof Pakulski
Decalogue V	Miroslaw Baka Jan Tesarz Krzysztof Globisz	Sławomir Idziak
Decalogue VI	Olaf Lubaszenko Grażyna Szapołowska	Witold Adamek
Decalogue VII	Anna Polony Maja Barelkowska Katarzyna Piwowarczyk	Dariusz Kuc
Decalogue VIII	Teresa Marczewska Maria Koscialkowska	Andrzej Jaroszewicz
Decalogue IX	Ewa Blaszczyk Piotr Machalica Jan Jankowski	Piotr Sobociński
Decalogue X	Jerzy Stuhr Zbigniew Zamachowski	Jacek Blawut

Recurring character of Artur Barciś

There is a nameless character, played by Polish actor Artur Barciś and possibly meant to be a supernatural figure, who observes the main characters at key moments but never intervenes (this character appears in all episodes except episodes 7 and 10).

Episode	Character played by Artur Barciś
Decalogue I	A homeless man sitting by a fire near the lake
Decalogue II	An orderly in the hospital
Decalogue III	A tram driver
Decalogue IV	A man rowing a boat and later seen carrying the boat
Decalogue V	A construction worker holding a measuring pole and then as a different construction worker carrying a ladder
Decalogue VI	A man carrying bags of groceries
Decalogue VII	Does not appear (Barciś was meant to be a man at the railway station, but Kieślowski experienced technical difficulties including him in this episode)
Decalogue VIII	A student at the university
Decalogue IX	A man riding a bicycle
Decalogue X	Does not appear

Milk

Milk is a symbolic element in some of the films.

Episode	Occurrence of milk in The Decalogue
Decalogue I	The milk is sour.
Decalogue II	The doctor carries milk almost all the time.
Decalogue IV	Michał leaves the house to buy milk.
Decalogue VI	Tomek becomes a milkman. Magda spills milk on the table.
Decalogue VII	Ewa tries to breastfeed Ania without any milk. Wojtek tells Majka that Ania needs a home with milk.
Decalogue VIII	There is an unopened bottle of milk on the table while Zofia and Elżbieta are having dinner.
Decalogue IX	Roman is pouring milk while watching a child play.

Reception

The Decalogue was admired by critics as well as by important figures from the film industry such as Stanley Kubrick.

The DVD box issue holds 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 28 reviews. The series was also praised by some renowned film critics, including Roger Ebert and Robert Fulford.

In the 2002 Sight & Sound poll to determine the greatest films of all time, The Decalogue and A Short Film About Killing received votes from 4 critics and 3 directors, including Ebert, New Yorker critic David Denby, and director Mira Nair. Additionally, in the Sight & Sound poll held the same year to determine the top 10 films of the previous 25 years, Kieslowski was named #2 on the list of Top Directors, with votes for his films being split between Decalogue, Three Colors Red/Blue, and The Double Life of Veronique.

In 2002, the film was also listed among the Top 100 "Essential Films" of all time by the National Society of Film Critics and ranked #36 in Empire magazine's "The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema" in 2010.

Longer feature films

Kieślowski expanded Five and Six into longer feature films (A Short Film About Killing and A Short Film About Love), using the same cast and changing the stories slightly. This was part of a contractual obligation with the producers, since feature films were easier to distribute outside Poland. In 2000, the series was released on five DVDs, each containing two parts of about 2 hours.

External links

• The Decalogue at IMDb
• The Decalogue at Rotten Tomatoes
• Facets Multi-Media: The Decalogue (synopsis, images, interview)
• The Decalogue at the Arts & Faith Top100 Spiritually Significant Films list
• Roger Ebert on The Decalogue
• Krzysztof Kieslowski Filmography
• Interview with Agnieszka Holland and Milos Stehlik on www.facets.org
• Images from the series on www.facets.org
• Short overview of The Decalogue and some other Kieslowski films on www.filmref.com
• Voted #2 on The Arts and Faith Top 100 Films (2010)