“XABO: FATHER BONIECKI” WINS GRAND PRIX
The documentary by Aleksandra Potoczek won the International Documentary Film Festival Flahertiana in Russia.
International Documentary Film Festival “Flahertiana” is held in the Russian city of Perm. The name of the festival refers to one of the world's precursors of documentary filmmaking, Robert Flaherty – the director of the famous film “Nanook of the North” (1922). For this reason, the prizes awarded at the festival are called the “Nanook Award” and in previous years they went to Poles on numerous occasions.
This year, Aleksandra Potoczek's documentary produced by the Tygodnik Powszechny Foundation was invited to the programme. The film stole the hearts of the festival jury and won the Grand Prix. “xABo: Father Boniecki” is a documentary story about Father Adam Boniecki – one of the most controversial and rebellious figures of the Catholic Church in Poland, an intellectual who diagnoses reality. It's a film made during a never-ending journey, during which he summarises and reflects on his choices, decisions, and his calling. Two contrasting worlds intermingle in the film: the public one, in which Father Boniecki is a well-known media figure, and the private one of silence, of solitude, of the relationship between man and God, of mystery.
The list of winners can be found here.