The Consul

A frustratingly dry black comedy which satirises bureaucracy, hypocrisy and greed (what else?) as it follows an ingenious and daring con-man around modern Poland. Fronczewski's performance as the eponymous hero is subtly modulated and appropriately charismatic, while the slow-to-start story, which eventually sees him pose as a nonexistent Austrian diplomat, is fascinating enough in a House of Games kind of way. But the whole could have benefited from more ebullient direction; as it is, the 'moral' (the swindler couldn't operate successfully if it weren't for the complicity of both his victims and the State) tends to overwhelm any humour or narrative drive.