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Movie on WWII Ukrainian massacres of Poles

PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge 29.08.2014 10:05
Award-winning director Wojciech Smarzowski will begin filming a movie about the WWII massacres of Poles by Ukrainian guerrillas this autumn.
Image: Glow ImagesImage: Glow Images

Image:
Image: Glow Images

Smarzowski's film, which has the working title of Hatred (Nienawisc), is based on a 2006 collection of tales by author Stanislaw Srokowski.

Srokowski has claimed that the film will be a positive factor in Polish-Ukrainian relations.

“This film will not divide people,” he told culture site wnas.pl this week.

“On the contrary, as I see it, this is a film that will bring Poles and Ukrainians together, and likewise the whole world in the fight against fascist ideology,” he argued.

Over 60,000 ethnic Poles are believed to have been slaughtered by pro-Ukrainian independence guerrillas from 1943 to 1944.

The killings took place in Nazi-occupied territory in former south east Poland, principally in the Volhynia region, but also in several other areas.

Poles fought back, and it is estimated that about 2000-3000 Ukrainians were killed in Volhynia, and about 20,000 more when the fighting spread to other areas of south east Poland.

Wojciech Smarzowski is among Poland's most critically acclaimed directors, both at home and abroad. Ethnic tensions against the backdrop of World War II provided the subject for his award-winning 2011 movie Rose (Roza). (nh)

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