Gods

Film description:

“Gods” is the cinematic biography of the renowned Polish cardiac surgeon Zbigniew Religa, the first doctor in Poland to successfully undertake a human heart transplantation. Religa is a rebel who does not want to comply with the rigid hierarchy of the medical world. The ambitious surgeon fights for the right to use innovative therapy – he battles his older colleagues, who unwillingly look at the nonstandard actions of the young doctor, he fights authority that does not want to finance equipment necessary for groundbreaking operations. The film shows his determination in reaching his goals, but also his falls, from which the cardiac surgeon has to get back up.

In the film world of “Gods”, humour intertwines with dramatic situations, and the young doctor is depicted in an overtly human way – as ambitious but proud, unable to deal with the odds, and out of helplessness, looking for comfort in alcohol.

About the director:

Łuksz Palkowski is a Polish director and screenplay writer born in 1976. He made his mark in film in 2007 when still as an unknown director, he captured the hearts of festival audiences with a low-budget, but intriguing film about the inhabitants of an old tenement building in the Warsaw district Praga. The second success, also a commercial one, for the young director, was the film “Gods”, generously awarded at numerous Polish film festivals. In his films, Palkowski is brutally honest in the characters he creates. He does not idealize or crush them. Instead, he want’s them to be piercingly human, an undeniable insight into man.

Most important films:

• 2007 “Rezerwat”
• 2014 “Gods”

By Agnieszka Mysiak