The Perpetuation of the Myth of the Polish Mother In

THE PERPETUATION OF THE MYTH OF THE POLISH MOTHER

IN POLISH NATIONALIST DISCOURSE

THROUGH SELECTED FILMS FROM THE COMMUNIST ERA

A thesis submitted to the faculty of a , San Francisco State University . In partial fulfillment of n the requirements for ^ \ the Degree *0

Master of Arts

Cinema

Katarzyna Izabela Rogawska

San Francisco, California

May 2017 Copyright by Katarzyna Izabela Rogawska 2017 CERTIFICATION OF APPROVAL

I certify that I have read The Perpetuation o f the Myth o f the Polish

Mother in Polish Nationalist Discourse Through Selected Films From the

Communist Era by Katarzyna Izabela Rogawska, and that in my opinion this work meets the criteria for approving a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree Master of Arts in Cinema at

San Francisco State University.

Aaron Kemer, Ph.D. Professor of Cinema

R. L. Rutsky, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Cinema THE PERPETUATION OF THE MYTH OF THE POLISH MOTHER

IN POLISH NATIONALIST DISCOURSE

THROUGH SELECTED FILMS FROM THE COMMUNIST ERA

Katarzyna Izabela Rogawska San Francisco, California 2017

The aim of this thesis is to examine the myth of the Polish Mother within Polish national discourse and its manifestations in the realm of cinema. In the first part of my paper I will trace the origins of the myth, its evolution, and its cultural and political significance. I will analyze the implications of the myth for shaping the image of Polish femininity through decades that followed its birth within Polish national and socio-cultural discourses. The second part of the paper will be a case study of selected Polish films that I see as cinematic representations of the myth or ones that seem to be a polemic against it, showing the particular ways in which the notions of gender and nationality are closely intertwined within the construct.

I certify that the abstract is a correct representation of the content of this

Date ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would first like to thank my thesis advisor Professor Aaron Kemer of the

Cinema Department for guiding me in writing this thesis. I would also like to thank Professor R. L. Rutsky, the second reader of this thesis for his support throught my studies at San Francisco State University. I would also like to acknowledge Professor Steven Kovacs for inspiring me to explore Polish cinematography in my thesis.

Finally, I must express my profound gratitude to my parents Jadwiga and

Czeslaw Miskiewicz who instilled in me the importance of education. Last but not least, I want to thank my spouse Marcin Rogawski for providing me with unfailing support and continuous encouragement through the process of resarching and writing this thesis.

v TABLE OF CONTENTS

Part I: History of the Myth...... 1 Introduction...... 1 Poland as Woman...... 2 The Birth of the Myth...... 4

The Communist Era...... 9

From a National Myth to a Stereotype...... 11

Part II: Cinematic Incarnations of the Polish Mother and Their Political Significance...... 13

Introduction...... 13

Sexmission - Case Study...... 16

Sexmission and Solidarity - The Heroic Tale Continues...... 24

Summary...... 30

Bibliography...... 32

VI 1

PART ONE: THE MYTH OF THE POLISH MOTHER - HISTORICAL CONTEXT.

Nationalism has typically sprung from masculinized memory, masculinized humiliation and masculinized hope.' - Cynthia Enloe

Everywhere there’s nationalism, there are people trying to control the bodies o f women.2 - bell hooks

The aim of this paper is to examine the myth of the Polish Mother within Polish national discourse and its manifestations in the realm of visual culture/cinema. In the first part of my paper I will trace the origins of the myth, its evolution, and its cultural and political significance. I will analyze the implications of the myth for shaping the image of

Polish femininity through decades that followed its birth within Polish national and socio cultural discourses. The second part of the paper will be a case study of selected Polish films that I see as cinematic representations of the myth or ones that seem to be a polemic against it. I will start with an overview of the films which employ and perpetuate the myth, to focus my analysis on a movie that never directly mentions the myth, but which I argue remains in a dialogue with it and draws its strength from critiquing attitudes that go against it. It is not my aim to examine the images of the maternal within Polish cinematic tradition in general, but more specifically, the particular ways in which the notions of gender and nationality are closely intertwined within the construct.

1 Cynthia Enloe, Bananas, Beaches, and Bases: Making Feminist Sense o f International Politics (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1990), 45. 2 bell hooks, Lecture delivered to SFSU students (speech, San Francisco, CA, February 20, 2017). 2

Poland as Woman

It’s not a carnival, but I want to dance, and I’ll dance with her till dawn It’s not a party, but I’m having fun. Sleepless nights, dreary days She’s not my lover, but I sleep with her, even though they laugh at me. Don’t ask me why I’m with her. Don’t ask me why not with another. Don’t ask me why I always want to fall asleep and wake up in her. Those dirty railway stations where I see her. Those crowds who curse quietly, This drunkard who is humming in his sleep that as long as we live, she will live.*3 Rebublika, ’’Don’t ask about Poland”

To begin with, the Polish translation of the word fatherland: ojczyzna, is a feminine noun, and so is Polska—the endonym for Poland. Therefore, linguistically, the nation is automatically gendered female. This affects and is reflected in the ways in which the country is portrayed visually.

In many countries symbols of freedom, revolution and national struggle are often depicted as women.4 We see this for instance with the French Revolution: Liberty Leading the People, in the famous painting by Delacroix, is a bare-chested woman leading fighters over the barricades, holding a tricolor flag in one hand and a musket in the other. At the gates of the United States the Statue of Liberty is a female figure in robes holding a torch and welcoming newcomers to American shores. Poland was no different in this respect, often anthropomorphized as woman in her visual representations.5

3 The song was written in 1980s, at the height of Poland’s struggle against the/Soviet regime. What may initially seem to be a tribute to a degraded female lover, is a tribute to Poland. The last line of the quote is a direct reference to Poland’s national anthem, which is clear to any Pole listening to the song: ’’Poland has not yet perished/So long as we still live.” 4 Maria Janion, Kobiety i duch innosci - http://www.akademiapolskiegofilmu.pl/pl/historia-polskiego- fllmu/artykuly/obraz-matki-polki-w-kinie-polskim-mit-czv-stereotyp/498 Accessed November 17th, 2016. 5 Elzbieta Ostrowska, Obraz Matki Polki w kiniepolskim, mit czy stereotyp? Kwartalnik Filmowy, 19997, No. 17, 130. 3

What sets the allegory of Poland as woman apart, however, is the way that Polish women are portrayed. Rather than representing a woman leading crowds to fight, Polish

19th century paintings usually represent Poland/the Polish woman as a widow, prisoner— regardless always a suffering one. In this sense it is more in line with the representations of Mother Ireland6 sheltering her hungry children or Mother India7—a virtuous traditional

Indian mother symbolizing the conquered and lamenting country. As I am going to show later on, these early representations, influenced by the Polish national struggle and

Catholicism, had a profound impact on shaping the idea of Polish femininity.

Even though Polonia remains the visual symbol of the Polish national struggle, the scope of her involvement is strictly regulated in the nationalist discourse, narrated mostly by men. As Magdalena M. Zaborowska and Justyna M. Pas observe, certain terms and ideas remain reserved exclusively for men: ’’While the patria-related notions of heroism, honor, freedom, and equality have been traditionally represented as masculine, Polonia, as she has been called, signified the matria, or the nation’s feminine qualities as homeland and hearth.”8 Even though real Polish women’s involvement in the 19th century national cause was often an active one, the most celebrated literary works by male writers from the period celebrate the female imagery associated with the Polish Mother.

6 Harpers Weekly 1850 cover pictures Mother Ireland on the shores of Ireland sheltering her starving children and begging for rescue. 7 Such images are visible in Abanindranath Tagore’s portrait “Mother India”/ “Bharat Mata”, or in Mehboob Khan’s epic drama “Mother India” from 1957. 8 Magdalena M. Zaborowska, Justyna M. Pas, Poland. Talking “Woman" in the Other Europe: The Case o f Poland since 1989 http://www.umich.edu/~glblfem/ZaborowskaPas-TalkingWoman.pdf Accessed February 15,2017. 9 Works of female writers such as Emilia Orzeszkowa or Narcyza Zmichowska, 19th century national heroines are a testimony to their active involvement in the struggle. 4

The Birth of the Myth

National myths have a crucial function in the process of constructing, reinforcing or unifying national identity and in the process of nation building. The 19th century was a fertile ground for the rise of national myths. They coexisted and reinforced one another at the service of the nationalist narrative. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that one of the most powerful myths in Polish national consciousness - the myth of the Polish Mother - was bom during the times of political oppression and turmoil.

Due to strong Catholic influences within the Polish tradition, religious tropes permeate every aspect of life. One of such myths was that of Poland’s Messianism.10 The myth, created by poet Adam Mickiewicz, instilled in Poles the belief that Poland was somehow destined to suffer for the freedom of Europe. Due to its unfortunate geographical location between powerful empires, its fate has often been that of a pawn in other countries’ political games, making it easy for the myth to take root and shaping Poles’ mentality

(Poland was an independent self-governing country for only twenty years in the period between 1795-1989). Romantic artists such as Mickiewicz and Slowacki took upon themselves the role of national prophets engraving the image of suffering Poland in the national consciousness.

Between 1795-1918 Poland was partitioned between three European empires:

Prussia, the Austrian Empire, and the Russian Empire. Even though it disappeared from the map of the world for over a century, and despite constant attempts to denationalize the population, Poles never ceased to fight with the empires in their hopes to regain

10 Joanna Szwajcowska, “The Myth of the Polish Mother” in Women in Polish Cinema, d. Ewa Mazierska and Joanna Szwajcowska (Berghahn Books, New York, 2006), 19. 5 independence. Two major uprisings against the occupiers took place during that time: the

November Uprising of 1830-31, and the January Uprising of 1863-64, and despite some positive impact, both of them ended in failure.

This time of unrest saw its reflection in the arts. Polish novelists, poets, musicians and painters were actively involved in the fight for independence. In this political climate, artists played a significant role in shaping, unifying, and preserving the identity of the broken nation. Polish Romanticism11—the artistic and literary movement of the 19th century —had its Polish version which was filled with political and patriotic undertones.

Adam Mickiewicz, later proclaimed Polish national poet due to the political nature and great influence of his oeuvre, wrote a poem/hymn titled: “To The Polish Mother”

(1831) addressing an anonymous woman who will suffer a loss of her son fighting for their country. Her role is to prepare her son for the tortures he is going to be subjected to defending his homeland, and prepare herself to endure the suffering as a result of the loss.

Patriotic and Catholic themes permeate the poem, as the mother is depicted praying to Holy

Mary. The parallel between the anonymous Polish mother (“everywoman”) and Virgin

Mary is striking; both of them are suffering and mourning the loss of their sons who died for the cause.

Visually, the portrayals of the Polish Mother often become intertwined with those of Mother PolandJMater Polonia. The nation (pictured as a female) represents the women who gave birth to the fighters for the cause, prepared to suffer the loss of their offspring.

The Polish Mother, Patria, or Mater Polonia are usually shown as widows or mourning mothers who lost their sons and husbands in the fight for independence. They are clad in

11 Period in Polish art and literature in the 19th c. lasted from 1820 to 1864. Unlike in other countries, it was strongly embedded in Polish fight for independence. 6 ascetic black dresses symbolic of mourning the lost men’s lives, but also mourning the suffering nation. This is when in Polish national discourse the notions of the nation, femininity, and motherhood become permanently intertwined.

The women of the 19th century Western Europe largely did not enjoy personal or political freedom. It is their fathers, husbands, brothers and sons who are the decision makers representing them in the public sphere.12 Due to Poland’s unique political situation in that period, Polish women,13 however, occupied a central position in the public and national discourses. Polish men, deprived of agency on the public political arena, could not fight openly; therefore, the actions of those willing to fight had to become clandestine.

Many joined Polish legions abroad to fight alongside other troops in hopes of helping the

Polish cause.14 Their agency in the public sphere on the former Polish lands was thus severely limited. Actions were taken by the occupiers to ensure that the next generations sever their ties with Poland (many of them were already bom on territories no longer considered Polish and officially located within the empires). The attempts to regain independence which culminated in two failed uprisings only aggravated these relations. As a consequence, the occupiers put a tighter grip on the Polish population, intensifying their repressive practices by, among other things, imposing numerous restrictions, such as a ban on speaking Polish in public.15

Since the public sphere was heavily controlled by the occupiers, the private sphere gained additional significance: For these reasons an interesting shift took place, making the

12 Ostrowska, 130. 13 It is important to note that not all Polish women enjoyed the same privileges, therefore the myth in its original form pertained first and foremost to the women of Polish gentry, or nobility (Szwajcowska, 16). 14 United under the slogan: “For our freedom and yours”, Polish soldiers fought alongside other troops fighting for independence. The slogan later became one of the unofficial mottos of Poland. 15 Szwajcowska, 16. 7 home the center of patriotic activity and preserving Polish heritage—a site of resistance. In this space, Polish women were granted the revered role of becoming the transmitters of language and culture, serving as a patriotic moral compass for their children. As

Szwajcowska observes: “In such a situation home became the main refuge o f‘Polishness’ and women began to play an important role in the transmission of national traditions and culture. The education of children gained the status of a patriotic task.”16

It is not public institutions that shaped the national consciousness, but the safe private sphere of the home. As a consequence, this education acquired another level of significance - an emotional component—patriotism not taught in school, but instead instilled by mothers in resistance to the official narratives of the occupiers.17 It was not the knowledge you acquired via public institutions, as a part of a curriculum; instead, it was a powerful emotional message one received at home together with other moral teachings, giving the next generation a sense of urgency to unite against the oppressive power. In this way, Polish mothers became “the most important defenders of the spiritual boundaries of

Poland.”18

Another important trope in the discussion of the myth is the above mentioned connection between the Polish Mother and Mater Dolorosa hinted at above. This connection had far-reaching consequences that shaped the Polish idea of femininity for generations to come, equipping the ideal Polish female with the characteristics usually associated with the virgin-mother Holy Mary: modesty, virtue, purity, sacrifice, suffering.

16 Szwajcowska, 16. 17 Szwajcowska, 17. 18 Elzbieta OStrowska, Obraz Matki Polki w kinie polskim, mit czy stereotyp? Kwartalnik Filmowy, 19997, No. 17, 131. While Polish women experienced relative emancipation compared to women from other

European countries, their self-expression was limited by this Christian imagery.

Influenced by the Marian cult so strongly embedded in the Polish culture and Polish nationalist narratives,19 the myth of the Polish Mother only theoretically equips Polish women with privileges and exaltation. In reality, it has consequences for the actual lives of women, imposing limits on their individual expression by strictly outlining the ideal of femininity they should adhere to, and holding them to a high, or rather impossible, moral standard, reducing their agency and scope of self-expression. According to Szwajcowska:

The feminist criticism directed against the figure of the Virgin Mary pertains to many aspects which in their comprehensive meaning constitute a very limiting and frustrating model of femininity and women’s roles. Firstly, the figure of Mary fixes the essence of being a woman on motherhood, which reduces the field of women’s self-fulfillment to the realization of a biological function. The association of femininity with motherhood has been strongly pronounced in the discourse of the Church (...). Secondly, through a simultaneous valorisation of virginity, the symbol sets up a constraint on female sexuality, as well as embodying an impossible ideal - motherhood and virginity being mutually exclusive, thus condemning real women to a position of imperfection. Thirdly, it reserves for a woman, at best, the place of a mediatrix with the divine (male) power. In fact, it situates her in an inferior position even in relation to her son.20

The myth of the Polish Mother was a patriarchal narrative inscribed in Polish nationalist discourse which operated on many levels. The notions of nation, religion, and the female

19 The oldest known Polish hymn was composed in the Middle Ages and addressed to the “Mother of God.” On many occasions, in times of combat, Polish men often prayed to the painting/figure of Holy Mother begging for her intercession. 20 Szwajcowska, 23. 9 body were all intertwined within the construct and converged to create an oppressive narrative, traces of which can be found even today in Poland’s sociopolitical climate as well as in the realm of visual culture. As Ostowska observes, through the myth, women’s role within the traditional patriarchal structure became additionally fortified with self- sacrifice in the name of national obligations.21

The Communist Era

The myth underwent an interesting metamorphosis during the communist times.

With its nationalist and religious undertones, it was an unwelcome and possibly dangerous construct in a country remaining under the Soviet sphere of influence. Since the Catholic

Church constituted the major ideological opponent for the Soviet-dominated communist party, the authorities knew it would be impossible to win this war in an open encounter in a predominantly Catholic Poland. Instead of trying to erase the glorious myth of the patriotic Polish female, suffering and sacrificing for the men and homeland, the communists appropriated the myth, equipping it with elements of the communist ideology.

As Elzbieta Ostrowska observes:

The image system was adapted to the demands of the new communist ideology. This appropriation of elements derived from the national patriotic tradition into the discourse of communist ideology was a very efficient strategy to establish the illusion of continuity in national life, an attempt to convince society of the correctness of the new political situation. Indeed, there is a strange compatibility, probably rooted in a shared patriarchal nexus, between the older Polish national discourse and that of the communists in relation to female sexuality. Though for different reasons,

21 Ostrowska, 138. 10

both deprived women of their sexuality or rather subsumed it into different, ‘higher’ values, patriotic and proletarian aims respectively.22

Hence, the heroic patriotic Polish mother willing to give birth to sons who would fight for the patria was transformed into a female communist worker giving birth to next generations of communist workers willing to build the socialist paradise in unison.

Her sacrifice in devotion to the national cause gave way to the sacrifice for the socialist homeland, as well as sacrifice for her children dealing with day to day responsibilities and struggles of the harsh communist reality.23 The Polish woman’s heroism manifested itself in getting food on the table for her family. Chris Corrin describes the experience of women in selected countries of the Soviet Bloc, including Poland, as a

“double burden.”24 On the surface it seemed as if women from East Central Europe experienced relative liberties compared to Western women: they had the highest rates of

labor force participation in the world, extended maternity leave and public (free) childcare, and abortion was quite liberal. However, there was a dissonance between the opportunities, quite advanced for the times, and the reality.

The laws, combined with the patriarchal culture of the Party and the society, turned out to be more of a trap than liberation. While encouraged to work professionally, women were still expected to perform all household duties without help from their partners. What is more, in many cases the work opportunities were far less equal than it might have seemed

22 Elzbieta Ostrowska, “Filmic Representations of the Myth of the Polish Mother” in Women in Polish Cinema, ed. Ewa Mazierska and Joanna Szwajcowska (Berghahn Books, New York, 2006), 45. 23 Matgorzata Bogunia-Borowska, “Heroizm i Sila Matki Polki” http://www.instvtutobvwatelski.pl/7070/komentarze/heroizm-i-sila-matki-polki Accessed March 5, 2017. 24 Chris Corrin, Superwomen & The Double Burden: Women’s Experiences of Change in Central & Eastern Europe & the Former Soviet Union (Sumach Press; First Canadian Edition edition, 1992). 11

in theory, as “[w]omen have been integrated into the labour force in a way that has allowed them to become ghettoized in low-pay, low-prestige areas of the economy traditionally referred to as the ‘non-productive’ industries.”25 Yet the communist propaganda created the image of the superwoman: the tractor driver, the crane operator, the bricklayer—able to work alongside men. The equality brought about by the work opportunities was only illusory, as it was not accompanied by changes in mentality.

From a National Myth to a Stereotype

Nowadays, the national myth has transformed into a stereotype with negative connotations. Despite its 19th century origins, the phrase ‘Polish Mother’ evokes different associations. Despite its roots in the exalted 19th century imagery, the term is currently used sarcastically to describe an overworked, overly sacrificing Polish mother willing to go to any length to serve her children. Occasionally, the phrase will be used to the service of the nationalist discourse but in everyday use it has nothing of the honorable veneer of a national heroine from the past, but rather an exploited female sacrificing everything for others.

25 Chris Corrin, “Superwomen & the Double Burden: Women's Experiences of Change in Central & Eastern Europe & the Former Soviet Union.” Article Excerpt https://www.questia.com/library/joumal/lP3- 449889021/superwomen-the-double-burden-women-s-experiences Accessed January 16, 2017. 12

PART TWO: CINEMATIC INCARNATIONS OF THE POLISH MOTHER AND THEIR POLITICAL SIGNIFICANCE.

Introduction

In this section of my thesis I would like to focus on the cinematic representations of the myth of the Polish Mother. I will mention and discuss films that point to the stability of the myth, but also ones which attempt to deconstruct it. While I list films that employ the myth in different ways, my primary analysis will be devoted to Juliusz Machulski’s

Polish cult comedy Sexmission (1984), which in fact never directly engages with the myth, but which, I argue, draws its strength from it.

There are a number of Polish films that perpetuate the femininity construct inherent in the myth, such as Jozef Lejtes’s Hurricane, Janusz Zaorski’s Mother o f Kings, or Andrzej

Wajda’s Man of Iron. Other filmmakers often employ a different technique—they often reverse it to portray images of degraded femininity that deconstruct the myth in order to undermine the political system in which the female characters had to exist. Such examples can be found in Agnieszka Holland’s Kobieta samotna or Kazimierz Kutz’s Krzyz walecznych.26

In a brief analysis of Janusz Zaorski’s Matka Krolow/Mother o f Kings,271 will point out the ways in which the mythologization of the Polish mother takes place in its proletarian version. The idea of adapting Kazimierz Brandys’s 1957 novel to screen was bom in the

1970s; however, state censors did not approve of its critical tone. The birth of the Solidarity

26 Ostrowska, p. 39. 27 Mother of Kings (Matka Krolow), directed by Janusz Zaorski (1982, released in 1987: Zespol Filmowy X i Rondo 2005), DVD. 13 movement in 1980 accompanied by slight loosening of censorship gave an opportunity for

Zaorski to return to his idea. Since the atmosphere of relative freedom did not last long, interrupted by the imposition of Martial Law in December 1981, the film had to be produced in secret and was finally completed in 1982. Naturally, like many films of that period filled with undertones of political critique, it ended up on a shelf and was released only in 1987, shortly before Poland shed the burden of communist rule.

The film is a saga of the King family, with the mother being the central figure of the story. When her husband dies in a tragic accident right after WWII, she becomes the sole breadwinner of the family, having to raise four young sons. Her main role in the film is already set up by the title. Her entire existence after her husband’s tragic passing is centered on self-sacrifice and raising her children.

Significantly, Zaorski insisted on a specific portrayal of the cinematic Mrs. Lucja

Krol, different from her literary prototype. In the movie, despite advances from male characters and a platonic relationship with a tragic communist figure, Dr. Wiktor Lewen,

Lucja remains a chaste widow, focusing her entire existence on her sons. Often pictured in modest outfits, often in black dresses and with a scarf on her head, she embodies the idea of a tragic widow and a suffering mother. This portrayal is more in line with the Romantic vision of a Polish Mother who subjects her entire existence to raise her men who are then to serve the country.

Mr. Lewen, the “decent communist,” is a constant presence in her household, serving as a father figure of sorts for her sons, some of whom become infatuated with the communist ideology through his teachings. Others, on the contrary, become fervent opponents of the regime, fighting it actively. When one of her sons is arrested for his 14 political activity, she goes from door to door begging for his release. At one point she trades her wedding band, one of her most precious possessions, for a chance to save her son - a gesture immediately evoking the image of 19th. century tragic widows and mothers of insurrectionists. One of her sons advances in the Party ranks, living a life of affluence with disregard for his family’s dole. While her sons fail miserably in different ways, she remains the figure of moral superiority.

The film is an incarnation of the mythical figure of Polish femininity, even if it escapes the myth’s premises at times due to a different political context. It is important to realize, though, that the movie, released in 1987 and describing the fate of the King family during the communist era, focused on pointing its criticism at the corrupt merciless regime which is manifested in the failure of each of the film’s male characters.28

When towards the end of the movie Lewen becomes a victim of party manipulations, he realizes the futility of his devotion to the system that betrayed him. In a moment of weakness, broken and betrayed by his colleagues, he decides to visit his longtime friend Lucja, yet abandons the idea in the last moment. One of the last shots in the film shows him turning away from her apartment building, and casting a look at the figure of Virgin Mary. The powerful symbol may be seen both to signify Lucja, the loyal friend, and a suffering mother who sacrificed everything for her sons. It is also a commentary on Lewen’s failure as a communist and a human, when he turns away his head unable to look at the figure. It is also a commentary on the system that failed the mother, sentencing her to years of struggle in extreme poverty, as well a corrupt manipulative machine which is willing to sacrifice its own (like Lewen) for the sake of the Party’s

28 Ostrowska, 47. 15 internal power struggles. Despite a different political context, the film applies the main premises of the myth to celebrate the chaste and tragic maternal figure who suffers in silence and never questions the need to sacrifice for others.

Sexmission - Case Study

The film that I would like to focus my analysis on is Juliusz Machulski’s

Sexmission. The Polish cult sci-fi comedy was made in 1981, but as in the case of Mother of Kings, the unfortunate timing of its making coincided with the imposition of the Martial

Law, and contributed to its later release in 1984.

In 1981 a military coup carried out on December 13th by General Jaruzelski aimed at eliminating any political opposition to the regime. Martial law was imposed, leading to mass arrests of opposition leaders. The political repression affected not only those who were in resistance, but also regular citizens who were subjected to repressions, curfew enforced by riot police and tanks in the streets.

Sexmission tells a story of two men who decide to undergo an experimental procedure of hibernation. Due to a mistake, they wake up decades later than planned as the only two surviving males in a world totally taken over by women, most of whom have never seen a live male before. The women inhabit an underworld with a very well- organized hierarchical structure, filled with advanced technology, yet without any knowledge of the outside world. Through their media channels, the women are taught that men were a threat to humanity. 16

The movie is an obvious commentary on the communist rule in Poland, often called a Polish equivalent to Kusturica’s 1995 hit Underground. This bold political satire, presented within a framework of a war of the sexes, functions as much more than that. Not only is it a film about war of genders, but a cultural text rejecting a certain idea of femininity that undermines the national narrative. Looking at Sexmission in this context, it will be very interesting to examine the ways in which the film comes into dialogue with the myth of the Polish Mother. It never mentions it explicitly, nor do any female characters serve as the embodiment of the myth. However, as I will argue in this chapter, the film applies the meanings inherent in myth in order to critique attitudes that do not comply with it, providing a foundation against which the New World in the film is constructed.

Sexmission employs traditional ideas of femininity that are equated with and dismissed as a grand lie, ignorance, threat to masculinity, the nation, and freedom- an ideal that can only be regained by the two surviving males. In other words, it equates the women’s world with a facade, a mistake, a failed and harmful ideology. But it also sees this world as a threat to the grand narrative of Polish masculinity and the myth of the Polish

Mother. The cinematic vilification of the modern women, albeit humorous, takes place on many planes.

Visually, the world the women have constructed, with its rigid architectural structure, seems sterile and modem, communicating the idea of progress. They have a highly hierarchical structure with a senior Chairwoman presiding over the community, live in sleek modem interiors, surrounded by hi-tech equipment used for everyday activities.

Machulski comments on how he used the architecture for satirical purposes, in order to 17 visually undermine the idea of progress in the women’s world.29 Namely, among all the advanced technology, certain elements of the mise-en-scene betray the fragility of the newly constructed, supposedly ideal world. In one scene the modem women operate highly advanced technology, while in the comer there is a bucket collecting water from a leaking ceiling. In another, while the two male characters are attempting to escape through the high-security hallways patrolled by women, they open one door to see a custodial closet filled with brooms and all the things a regular Polish cleaning lady would have. In yet another, one of them tries to hide behind a bathroom door, which falls off its hinges. These are used for humorous effect, but also to make the audience question the validity and superiority of the world presented on screen, to expose its artificiality, false appearances, and the makeshift nature of the world the women inhabit. These hints were easily understood by the Polish audience, reading it as a satirical scrutiny of their everyday political reality, a political system on the verge of implosion.

The space in which men are depicted as subordinate is presented as unnatural. The color palette applied strengthens the sense of artificiality, sterility, and lack of life, making it a laboratory-like space. The underground world inhabited by the women is literally without natural light. The purpose of the constructed space of the women’s world is to reproduce and reinforce the official narrative, to keep them literally in the dark. Those surviving elderly women who have seen the “light” (who remember the olden days when men and women coexisted in the “natural” world) are kept locked up in a Panopticon-like space under constant surveillance, deprived of privileges and access to many things. This

29 Juliusz Machulski, interview by Akademia Filmu Polskiego/Academy of Polish Film, Warsaw 2004, https://www.voutube.com/watch?v=5VN70t4vunU Accessed October 7, 2017. 18 underground female space is contrasted with the space of the outside world to which the two male characters finally escape. Followed by two females, they end up in a house at the seaside, surrounded by nature, lush landscapes, and chirping birds, further emphasizing the unnatural-natural binary pair. It is in the outside world that the “natural order” is restored when both men begin to pursue the women and both couples finally unite in heterosexual acts.

The appearance of the women in the underworld points to how they are coded visually. Wearing tight white outfits, they look like sci-fi characters, in stark contrast to the traditional Polish women in long black robes who embody the ideal Polish femininity. This visual element makes them look both highly sexualized and alien, othering them and distancing them even further when contrasted to the Polish Mother.

Women in Sexmission are presented as modem, competitive, aggressive, and career-driven. They are also hostile in contact with the men, immune to their pleading, threats, or flirtations. To control the men, they often use violence and even appear in riot gear to exercise state power over their unruly prisoners. They are depicted as predatory man-haters who see “naturalizing” the men, that is turning them into women, as the ultimate solution.

Most importantly, the new ‘superwomen’ are exclusively single and childless. They do not know about sex, and they procreate through parthenogenesis, producing only female citizens. The supposedly ideal female society is a world without sex. The sexual act is a thing of the (rejected and distorted) past, never discussed in public, but only a subject to reminisce about by the senile female survivors of the old order, who still remember the world in which men and women coexisted. The new women, living alone, reject their 19 sexual drive, swallowing pills daily to control it. In the nationalist narrative, where sex is never openly discussed, but only implied, it is acceptable only as a heterosexual act leading to procreation.

The Polish Mother’s sexuality is only implied through her motherhood—the core of her existence. The traditional Polish female is seen only through her role as a bearer of the nation’s men. In the case of the nationalist Catholic narrative the mention of the sexual act is considered undignified and in fact unimportant, therefore the women’s sexuality is never acknowledged. As Danuta Dqbrowska observes in her book: Domesticated World:

About Women's Experience o f History, 30 the myth of the Polish Mother is totally asexual.

Her motherhood exists outside sexuality or eroticism; depriving her of a connection to her body and turns her into an idea. Femininity in the Polish Mother myth can only be realized in motherhood. Giving birth and having offspring acquires in this context national significance, and is thus a political act. In times of political struggle perpetuating a nation is a public role of women—in this role women’s bodies are simultaneously elevated/sacralized and oppressed. The act of childbearing had national significance both in the 19th century Romantic tradition as well as in communist Poland.

The question of motherhood is a crucial one in the film. It distances the women from the ideal femininity established through the Polish Mother construct. This modem world is a world without mothers, as the women refuse to give birth to children. Instead, the new generations of women are products of parthenogenesis and are brought to life through tube reproduction. The women are unwilling to use their bodies as the incubators,

30 Danuta Dqbrowska, Udomowiony Swiat. O Kobiecym Doswiadczaniu Historii/Domesticated World: About Women’s Experience o f History (Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Szczecinskiego, March 2012). 20 instead using real incubators for breeding purposes. Their abstinence is in conflict with the promise of the “heterosexual salvation” of the nation. In this sense the rejection of sexual activity by the modem women and “saving humanity” when the opportunity arises can be seen as subversive of the nationalist narrative. Yet, their rejection of sexual activity and rejection of motherhood is presented as a lack, and makes them the butt of the joke. In fact, the men’s sexual jokes and innuendos are one of the main sources of humor in the film.

While female fecundity has a special importance for the national discourse, the modem women’s self-imposed control of their sexual drive is seen as subversive or threatening.

Sexmission seems to indicate that there is nothing that heterosexual intercourse would not fix. As Maks exclaims at one point in the film, frustrated at the women: “You went crazy because you haven’t had a man in a long while!”

The way the film seems to criticize this attitude is twofold: primarily, the women give up their right—or duty—to be mothers, or, in other words, to become vessels for the children to be bom. Secondly, they commit an even greater crime in the eyes of the two male characters: they deprive the girls bom in the process of the father figures. In consequence, taming is required and it takes place on the narrative level. Even those unexceptional specimens of the male species are still superior to the women running the underworld. Despite their obvious flaws that make them humorous, they still outsmart the female leadership and save the world by having sex with the women.

Fatherhood and family are crucial in Machulski’s Sexmission. According to

Malgorzata Radkiewicz, the way genders are constructed in the context of the film are strictly tied to procreation and family.31 As we leam from the opening scene in the film,

31 Malgorzata Radkiewicz, “Sexmission - Gender Analysis” (online lecture, November 14, 2011). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flKUlmbO K4 Accessed October 20, 2016. 21 both of the male characters are presented in the context of their private lives. One of the characters is not a father, while the other gladly abandons his parental duties to participate in a scientific experiment. Yet, once they reappear in the new world ruled by women, they bring up the significance of the father role in the societal context, seeing themselves as the compassionate enlightened saviors of the human race. Or, as Radkiewicz humorously observes: “the old good world has fallen apart, the new system excludes men and threatens them with extinction, yet what the men are mostly concerned with is getting laid.”32

On the narrative level the order in Sexmission is restored when the men manage to convince the women to escape the underworld and seduce them, introducing them to ars amandi soon after they expose the fraud behind their “perfect world.” In this sense, the men become the women’s teachers: sexually and politically. Their sexual virility, together with the women’s potential to be mothers, is a hope for the future and for the nation. It is also significant that the two couples are transplanted from a space of power and high-tech to a suburban home; in other words, the women become domesticated and tamed. The final patriarchal touch is the men’s expedition back to the underworld’s laboratories to fertilize the eggs with their sperm, making sure they bring back the male population to the planet.

The film perpetuates the patriarchal notions of dominance and protects its male characters visually by guarding them from the viewers’ gaze, at the same time granting them control over the modem women. Despite their prisoner status and the fact they remain under surveillance, they are the ones owning the gaze. In one scene the rebellious female

Lamia sneaks into the prison-like section of the underworld where elderly women are located, or in fact imprisoned. These women from the previous generation constitute a

32 Ibid. 22 threat to the system, as they remember the world filled with men and could expose the falsity of the regime. Lamia, fascinated by one of the men and sexually awakened by him, visits one elderly lady to gain some knowledge about the old world. As they speak, on the

TV screen in the old lady’s cell they show a surveillance video of the two male specimens taking a shower. As the camera pans the men’s bodies from top to bottom, the moment it is about to show their penises, the camera cuts to the elderly lady’s face expressing naughty excitement and nostalgia. It is interesting that the film protects its male protagonists even by not allowing male frontal nudity.

This protection of the phallic power is contrasted with the visual control the males are able to exercise in the underworld despite their fugitive status. As they begin their great escape, they start penetrating different levels of the underworld. Most women inhabiting it are unsuspecting and unaware of the men’s presence, which gives the men the ability to engage in voyeuristic pleasures, peeping and gazing at the women freely. The women’s bodies are literally on display for the men, often fragmented, as happens in the pool scene, where Albert and Maks look through a small window into a pool full of naked women, admiring their breasts and pubic areas exposed for their pleasure. In the case of the women, the camera does not protect them in any way; instead, the film exposes and objectifies the women granting the males power over the unsuspecting women.

Machulski’s Sexmission is not only a tale about the world of the future, nor the way totalitarian regimes stupefy their citizens. It is a story of “taming of the shrew” which ridicules women’s attitudes of agency and governance presenting them as unnatural and absurd. The strength of the film’s satire lies in its patronizing attitude towards the idea of 23

progress women might represent. It also enforces the patriarchal tale of male resistance

fighters who ultimately achieve victory for the nation.

Sexmission and Solidarity - The Heroic Tale Continues

This is not to say that women do not have roles to play in the making and unmaking of states: as citizens, as members of the nation, as activists, as leaders. It is to say that the scripts in which these roles are embedded are written primarily by men, for men, and about men, and that women are, by design, supporting actors whose roles reflect masculinist notions of femininity and of women’s proper place.33

(...) women are relegated to minor, often symbolic, roles in nationalist movements and conflicts, either as icons of nationhood, to be elevated and defended, or as the booty or spoils of war, to be denigrated and disgraced. In either case, the real actors are men who are defending their freedom, their honour, their homeland and their women.34

In her pivotal text, “The Poetics of Polish Patriarchy/’35 Agnieszka Graff analyzes

an interesting correspondence between Machulski’s film and the role of women on the

Polish political arena during the rise of the Solidarity movement. She points to the fact that

the communist era constituted an interesting caesura in the Polish patriarchal discourse.

The era of the Real Man: the Romantic insurrectionist, followed by the ethos of the WWII

Resistance Fighter, was broken by the communist regime which forced the Polish man to

become an internal emigre. He could either remain active on the political arena (this,

33 Joane Nagel, Masculinity and nationalism: gender and sexuality in the making of nations, https://biblioteca-altemativa.noblogs.Org/files/2012/l 1/nagel masculinity-and-gender.pdf Accessed March 2017, 243. 34 Nagel, 244. 35 Agnieszka Graff, “The Poetics of Polish Patriarchy” in World Without Women. W.A.B., Warsaw, 2001. 24 however, potentially equaled with conformism, Party membership, or servitude towards the new regime), or withdraw into obscurity, becoming the domesticated husband delegated to gardening or fixing kitchen cabinets. In this sense, the regime symbolically castrated and emasculated the Polish man.

With men facing these limitations, an interesting shift took place in which women took over the role of those who inhabited the public space more actively. In the time of severe food shortages and food rations, at times Polish citizens had to stand hours in lines for basic goods when supplies were delivered to stores. Even though men were still primary family providers and usually occupied more important positions professionally, women were typically the ones responsible for shopping; they were the ones “hunting for food” in the public space. The fact this interesting reversal of public and private roles took place was not seen as a new chapter in women’s history, a challenging yet positive step forward, but rather as a peculiar anomaly, an abnormal temporary disturbance to gender roles caused by the “evil regime.”36

This reversal of gender roles, atypical for Catholic patriarchal Poland, found its reflection in the cult comedy Sexmission. In this sense, the film was not only a metaphor of a totalitarian regime, but also a parody on the unwelcome encroachment of women into the public sphere, mocking their ‘unnatural’ and failed attempt at governance. A story in which aggressive, self-sufficient women ruled the world and had no interest in sharing it with men was presented as a dangerous concept, unthinkable and absurd.

It seems that the politicized empowered femininity constituted a threat to the

Romantic ethos of a Polish resistance fighter. The quest for manhood of the Polish man

36 Graff, 344-45. 25 needed to be accompanied by the images of tame femininity (either that of a chaste wife or a devoted mother) in order to complete the rite of passage of the Polish men, simultaneously erasing Solidarity’s women from the legend, and (indirectly, but still) perpetuating the myth of the Polish Mother.

The myth of the Polish Mother, so intertwined with the cult of Virgin Mary, gave women an illusory sense of importance, elevating them in the national discourse, while in real life their struggles were not treated seriously, and they had little to no say regarding their own rights. The ostentatious worship of idealized femininity of the Polish Mother was in stark contrast to the day-to-day treatment of flesh and blood Polish women, many of whom gladly subscribed to the myth, denying themselves any importance or agency in the tale of freedom.

If the communist reality with its reversal of gender roles was seen as an exception to the rule, the Solidarity movement could be viewed as the force that brought back the

Polish Man: the patriot, the fighter, the protector.37 While the men went to protest and strike, the women could get back home to support and facilitate the struggle, prepare lunch boxes, and wait patiently worrying about their heroic husbands and sons. If we accept this line of interpretation, Sexmission ’s message becomes clear: if Poland is female, the males are there ready to save her. Despite their character flaws, through their gender they still remain the only ones authorized to be the national heroes. Sexmission’s ending is a patronizing and warm-hearted pat on the back for the women who did try to rule, but in their gullibility lived a lie to finally be outsmarted, giving up their positions to the all- knowing males ready to “mansplain” to them how “real life” works.

37 Graff, 345. 26

In reality, in communist Poland of the early Solidarity period, women played an active role in the struggle to dismantle the regime. The entire movement was initiated when one of the Gdansk shipyard workers (former communist work leader) Anna

Walentynowicz was fired by the factory authorities, leading to a massive outburst of support for her from her colleagues. Even though this was the event that sparked the wave of protests and open resistance, the event that is now presented as the legend initiating

Solidarity is Lech Walesa’s famous climb over the shipyard gate to speak to the workers.38

When Martial Law was imposed in Poland in December 1981, the communist authorities targeted the most prominent and outspoken Solidarity leaders, leading to mass arrests, interrogations and internments. During the days and years that followed, it was the

Solidarity’s women who kept the movement alive for eight years, building a network of communication for the entire movement, communication with foreign press, organizing hideouts for the movement members threatened with internment, distributing illegal pamphlets, establishing and publishing for years a major resistance magazine Tygodnik

Mazowsze (Regional Weekly) ,39

Yet, in the 1989 Round Table debate between the communist and Solidarity leaders, which initiated the abolition of Communism not only in Poland, but the majority of the

Eastern Bloc countries, only one female Solidarity representative was present. Most of the prominent females involved in the movement were forgotten by history to such an extent that their names were nowhere to be found; the historic photographs do not list them in the captions. Marta Dzido and Piotr Sliwowski, who made a feature-length documentary titled

38 Graff, 346. 39 Shana Penn, Solidarity's Secret: The Women Who Defeated Communism in Poland (University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor 2005), 174. 27

Solidarity According to Women40 in 2014, claimed it took them months and sometimes years to identify and locate the women from the archival photographs in order to record their stories and acknowledge their role in Poland’s history, as often even their former colleagues were not able to recall their names.

As Ewa Ossowska, Walesa’s first assistant during the early Solidarity days, summed up, the Solidarity movement was a grassroots movement which brought together

Poles of both genders and all walks of life in the fight for independence, uniting them against oppression and injustice.41 At that moment in history women did not deem it appropriate to make sure they secured their own rights, putting the nation’s future before everything else. In the words of Maria Janion, one of Poland’s most prominent feminists:

The well-known difference of opinions in Poland concerns what is ‘serious’ and what is ‘unserious’. The dominating way of thinking of the opposition in the 1970s and 1980s was that the struggle for independence was serious, the struggle for women’s rights was not. This kind of unifying reasoning was, at that time, in a way, close to mine. I remember when, during a feminist discussion in an international gathering in West Berlin at the end of the 1980s, I maintained that Solidarity, first, had to win independence and democracy for all of society and only then would it be able to deal with women’s questions and improvement of women’s situation.42

This, however, did not take place. The first Polish post-communist democratic government was formed and came into power in 1990. In this time of transformation and political uncertainty, where the galloping inflation and agricultural reform seemed too hard to

40 Solidarity According to Women, directed by Marta Dzido and Piotr Sliwowski, Poland, 2015. 41 Solidarity According to Women - Debate on the History of the Independence Movement. Accessed October 20, 2016 https://www.voutube.com/watch?v=raeRmOh77QM 42 Maria Janion, Kobiety i Duch Innosci (Wydawnictwo Sic!, 2nd Ed., 2006). 28 control, the return to tradition and religious principles was the only thing the new government deemed achievable. 43 In the atmosphere of chaos surrounding the transformation, the government made it its goal to first deal with the bodies of women, introducing abortion laws much stricter that the ones during the communist rule.

Many Western observers find it difficult to reconcile the political transformation of post-communist Poland with Polish society's fierce and enduring attachment to traditional nationalist scripts. Indeed, what could be more natural than for Western observers, having contested communist autocracy in the name of democratic freedom, to presume that the undoing of Communism would sweep away all obstacles to democracy? However, the "transition narrative" crudely falsifies post-communist developments. What emerged from the Quiet Revolution of 1989 in Poland was a highly traditional culture, rooted in religious fundamentalism, nationalist ideology and patriarchal practices.44

Ironically, Poland in the process of democratization was accompanied by a sudden reinforcement of the symbolic patriarchal domination, as if the nation, to reinvent itself after the rupture, needed to regain its balance by returning to its traditional values and

Romantic ideals.

Even nowadays many women who participated in the movement tend to downplay their role in the process, reducing their own role to merely helping the men who led the movement. Their attitude shows the myth of the Polish Mother is very much alive in the

Polish mentality to the point that these women are able to deny their own agency. An

American scholar Shana Penn, who came to visit Eastern Europe when the transformation

43 Graff, 343. 44 Halina Filipowicz, “Poland. Talking “Woman” in the Other Europe: The Case of Poland since 1989”. http://www.umich.edu/~glblfem/Zaboro wskaPas-Talking Woman.pdf Accessed February 19, 2017. 29 was underway, carried out a thorough study of women’s involvement in the Solidarity movement, published as Solidarity’s Secret: Women Who Defeated Communism in Poland, in which she tells a story of fearless women who risked their lives to keep the resistance alive, only later to be erased from Solidarity’s official heroic nationalist narrative. Penn was one of the first to give voice to the “unsung, forgotten heroines of the Polish underground.”45

Zaborowska and Pas brilliantly expose the artificiality of the myth as a construct, sarcastically pointing out the discrepancy between the imagery and the actual situation of

Polish women in the society:

Polish cult of the Virgin verges on goddess worship with specific political and practical results. Mary has been officially crowned the “Queen of Poland” by the authorities of the Catholic Church - Poland seems to be the only female divine monarchy in the world—as well as proclaimed our nation’s “Divine Mother.” A feminist paradox incarnate, she is a monarch and a divine mom no one has to take seriously. She is the infinitely forgiving, passive, and merciful mother figure dreamt up by a patriarchal society in which all women are expected to be just like her: lovely visions to behold but never opinionated subjects.46

Lech Walesa, Solidarity’s icon, built his image as a devout Catholic and a family man: a husband and a father of eight. His household was a deeply patriarchal one, and he proudly displayed an image of Virgin Mary in the lapel of his jacket. The contrast between the ostentatious worship of idealized femininity of the Polish Mother was in stark contrast to the day-to-day treatment of flesh and blood Polish women, many of whom gladly subscribed to the myth themselves, denying themselves any importance or agency.

45 Irena Grudzinska-Gros. Foreword to Shana Penn’s book Solidarity ’s Secret: Women Who Defeated Communism in Poland, XII. 46 Filipowicz, 6. 30

While the idealized unreal and sacralized femininity based on the Marian model is an object of worship, it also serves another purpose: it pushes out and dismisses the flesh and blood women who could potentially gain agency on the political arena. Sacralized femininity reduced to symbols such as images of Virgin Mary on the shipyard gates during the workers’ strikes, or in Lech Walesa’s lapel, is at most associated with intercession/support, and never with direct leadership.47

Summary

Since the 19th century the myth of the Polish Mother has played a crucial role in shaping the ideas of femininity in Polish consciousness and nationalist discourse. Each period and regime has appropriated the ideal the myth embodies and translated it into its context. Such was the case with the Polish insurrections of the Romantic period, the underground resistance of the WWII, the communist era, or even contemporary Poland in which the myth is still alive.

Through cinema, the images of the Polish Mother are either reproduced or contested, yet they are always present in the collective memory to serve the cause at hand.

Whether it be through the admired suffering mother in The Mother o f Kings or the patronizingly ridiculed rebellious superwomen in Sexmission, cinema continues to find ways to convey and instill the patriarchal notions of femininity and obedience. The latter film, created at the time of intense resistance against the communist regime, inscribes perfectly the nationalist tale of brave men who save the nation.

47 Graff, 346. 31

Needless to say, in this tale nationalisms are gendered male, seen as a battle to be fought by men. Hence in the case of Solidarity, as the legend says, the confrontation took place between the male Union workers and the communists to bring back order in the country devastated by decades of Soviet influence. Such a narrative, erasing women’s involvement from history’s pages, created a rite of passage for Polish men, bringing back an opportunity to manifest their courage, valor, and devotion to their nation as heroes.

Both the cinematic examples from the communist era analyzed above, as well as the political events that followed, are a testimony to the fact that the myth of the Polish

Mother is very much alive in the Polish nationalist discourse. Cinema plays an important role in perpetuating such myths, but it also has the potential to expose and deconstruct them. While Sexmission served the nationalist narrative, nowadays, from the perspective of over three decades, it also serves as a monument of ossified attitudes that need to be transformed. 32

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