TELEWIZJA POLSKA presents a film from the DECALOGUE series
The law ought not to imitate nature.
Its role is to correct it.
DECALOGUE FIVE
Laws were invented by man to regulate social relations.
We are what we are as a result of the laws
that we observe or break.
Human beings are free...
In so far as they recognise others' right to be free.
Punishment...
Punishment is a form of vengeance.
Especially when it does injury
without preventing crime.
In whose name does the law take vengeance?
Is it really on behalf of the innocent?
Do the innocent make the laws?
Mr Piotr Balicki.
Please go in now.
You're throwing away rags?
They can come in useful.
Someone threw this at me.
– Did he hit you? – No.
Do you recognise it?
Is the movie any good?
No, it's boring.
What's it about?
Love, but boring.
Anyway, just now we're closed.
What are you doing?
Pulling out grey hairs.
Where can I get a cab?
A taxi cab?
At Castle Square.
The Warsaw Philharmonic was the venue of a concert...
organised by the Ministry of Culture.
Here you go.
I must reflect, although I know what I want to say.
I've had this question put to me twice.
When I sat my entrance exam I didn't have to think.
Four years ago, in this building,
I was no longer so sure.
I've brought your order!
Faster, Beatka!
Hi!
– Want your portrait done? – No.
– Is Castle Square this way? – Straight ahead.
This profession allows one to repair
mistakes made by that juggernaut
we call the machinery of Justice.
Or at least one may try to repair them.
I'm also attracted
most of all perhaps, by the chance
to come to grips with people I wouldn't meet anywhere else.
Go away, you'll scare off the pigeons.
Go away!
What a jerk!
Are you free?
I'm washing the car.
We'll wait behind there, it's cold.
We all wonder sometimes if our work
isn't pointless.
It's becoming increasingly difficult
to believe in the meaning of what we do.
Or hope to do.
This may be due to the erosion of standards.
Or worse still, of values.
Sorry, you weren't charged for the soup greens.
Would you like a ride, Miss Beatka?
Hey, there!
Good morning.
Yes?
There's this...
Have you come to put up the shelves?
No.
Oh well, I wondered...
There's this picture...
Can you
have it enlarged?
The creases will show.
It doesn't matter.
All right.
Excuse me!
Is it true you can tell from a picture
if a person is alive or dead?
Someone's been pulling your leg.
Deterrence implies using the sentence,
or more precisely, the condemned,
to intimidate others.
You'll find it in Article 50 of the Penal Code.
I don't like your sarcastic tone.
It's a dubious justification for the harshness of the sentences,
not only in my opinion.
They are often unjust.
Legia, our pride and joy, Warsaw's top team!
Want one?
The wife made them.
– Tea. – We don't serve it.
– What can I have then? – Coffee, cakes...
Coffee and a cake.
– What sort of cake? – An eclair.
Not that one!
The other.
"Since Cain
the world has neither been intimidated nor ameliorated by punishment."
And now news for drivers: Road conditions are tricky.
Rain is forecast
for all regions except the east.
Madziu!
I'm happy to inform you that you've passed the exam.
After your four years of studies and four years of legal training.
We welcome you as a colleague.
Hey, driver!
Excuse me!
Are you going to Mokotów?
No, to Wola.
We're in a hurry.
To Mokotów.
Where was he going?
To Wola.
Can you shut the window?
It's chilly.
Turn left here.
Straight ahead is quicker.
I prefer this way.
As you like.
You can stop here.
– You can't go any further. – I wouldn't go anyway.
Jesus...
The safe...
Money...
My wife...
Money...
Please...
This is the story of a very brave and very clever golden lion.
Every day he was a bit braver.
Because all the gown-up lions would tell him, just like you,
that a lion should always be lion-hearted.
I declare the case closed.
Is it all over?
Yes.
It's me.
I lost, absolutely.
I really don't know.
Maybe I'll walk it off.
Don't come and fetch me.
How are you?
Had a good sleep? I'm glad.
Bye.
Mr Lazar!
Jacek!
Excuse me, sir.
I know it's not customary.
No, it isn't.
I wanted to ask you, now that it's all over...
Would an older, famous lawyer have made any difference to the case?
– Someone other than me? – No difference at all.
What I said couldn't...
If I had put it better...
Your final summing-up was the best speech against capital punishment
I've heard for years.
The sentence was a foregone conclusion.
You couldn't be faulted as a lawyer or as a man.
The circumstances were tragic,
but I'm happy to have met you.
In this case we might have had a better judge.
I'm responsible for what's to follow. Does that help?
No.
You know, maybe this is irrelevant.
But when that boy spoke today
about how he wound the rope round his hands
in the cafe on Krakowskie Przedmiescie.
– I was there. – Where?
In the same place, at the same time.
It was the day I passed my bar exam.
Maybe I could have done something?
You are too sensitive for this profession.
It's too late to change it.
Today you have become a little older.
The warden will see you in a minute.
– How's things? – Getting warmer.
Good morning.
The curtain is stuck.
Clear it up.
Come in!
We're ready, sir.
Thank you.
Thank you. It's what I expected.
So did I.
Yes, Counsellor, you have half an hour.
Half an hour.
Very well.
Come in!
Escort him to see the prisoner.
– Good morning, Counsellor. – Good morning.
I'm seeing the prisoner. He asked for me.
A tough duty.
You're right, Prosecutor. It's my first time.
Let us hope also the last.
This isn't the right moment, but we meet so rarely...
My congratulations. I hear you've had a son.
Yes, just recently. Thank you.
You wanted to see me.
Yes, have you seen my mother?
Yes.
Did she cry?
She did.
Maybe she wanted to say...
Did she give you a message for me?
No.
No, she just cried.
Sit down.
Could you...
Could you try once more?
See my mother, I mean.
Of course I could.
When it's all over.
Of course.
I thought so, because...
Because you called out to me as I left the court.
You called out "Jacek".
I called out.
I wanted to...
I'm nearly twenty-one.
But when you called out
I felt like crying.
In court I said...
I don't know. I didn't really listen.
Only when you called out.
They were all
against me.
Against what you did.
It comes to the same thing.
You wanted me to see your mother.
Yes.
I'd like her to let me be buried alongside father.
There's room for one.
I can have a proper burial, can't I?
Yes.
The priest came and said it was all right.
Yes, it's possible.
Where father's buried...
...there's room for one more.
It was to be for Mother, that's what we agreed.
I want to ask her to let me have that place.
Yes, sir.
The warden wants to know if you're ready.
Not yet.
You were saying...?
I don't remember.
You said the plot was for three people.
Yes, three.
There's Dad and Marysia, and room for one more.
It's five years since Marysia's funeral.
Five years ago she was run over by a tractor.
In our village.
She'd just started the sixth grade.
She was twelve years old.
In the sixth grade.
The tractor driver and I... we were friends.
We'd both been drinking.
Wine and vodka.
Then he got in his tractor and ran her over.
On the meadow.
There was this meadow by the woods.
I've been thinking here... thinking...
If she were still alive everything might be...
Maybe I'd have stayed, I wouldn't have had to leave home.
She was my sister.
I had three brothers but only one sister.
I was her favourite.
I liked her best too.
It might all have turned out different.
Maybe.
Maybe?
Maybe all this wouldn't have happened?
Yes.
Maybe I wouldn't be here now?
The warden wants to know if you're ready.
I'll never be "ready", you can tell him that.
You'll never be ready.
Never!
We bought that plot.
Do you have the verdict?
It's all here.
Let's go.
You can leave your case here.
After you.
Please take him along.
The prosecutor would like you to finish now.
Among my things you'll find
a receipt from a photographic studio.
I left a photo to be enlarged.
I'd like Mum to have it.
What's on the photo?
Marysia's first communion.
It was Mother's, but I took it away with me.
It got creased.
Time to go.
Please, sir...
No...
Hold him!
Open up!
Name and surname?
Lazar, Jacek.
Date of birth?
17 March 1967.
Parents' names?
Jan.
And Lucja.
I'll read the verdict.
"Sentence passed in the name of People's Republic of Poland
on 27 November 1987.
After examining the case of Jacek Lazar,
charged with the murder of Waldemar Rekowski
committed in Warsaw on 16 March 1987,
the court found the accused guilty
and in accordance with Article 148 § 1
and Article 44 § 2 of the Penal Code
sentenced him to death
and loss of civil rights in perpetuity."
The sentence was upheld by the Supreme Court.
The Council of State did not recommended clemency.
The sentence will therefore be carried out.
A smoke?
Can I have one without a filter?
His hands!
Proceed.
Hold him!
That's it! Pull!
Tighter!
It's revolting.
Utterly revolting.
Intolerable.
Cast
Directed by
Director of Photography
Music