The Taste of the Black Earth

A film about the 1920 Silesian uprising, when bands of insurgents rebelled against the German occupation troops. The story is told through the eyes of a 16-year-old boy, youngest of a family of seven sons who join the uprising; and in approach the film owes more to Hollywood than to a Communist propaganda tradition, though without the simplification of issues or the false heroics of the Western attitude to immediate history. Visually it's a small masterpiece, stunningly shot in the beautiful browns and greens of the 'land' for which the men are fighting.