''The Big Animal'' ( pl, Duże zwierzę) is a 2000 Polish film directed by Jerzy Stuhr from a screenplay by

Krzysztof Kieślowski Krzysztof Kieślowski (; 27 June 1941 – 13 March 1996) was a Polish film director and screenwriter. He is known internationally for '' Dekalog'' (1989), ''The Double Life of Veronique'' (1991), and the ''Three Colours'' trilogy (1993 –1994 ...

, based on a short story ''Wielbłąd'' (1995) by Kazimierz Orłoś.

Plot

Mr. Zygmunt Sawicki is a

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

employee, who finds a camel in his yard one day. He decides to take charge of it and he and his

wife A wife (plural, : wives) is a female in a marital relationship. A woman who has separated from her partner continues to be a wife until the marriage is legally Dissolution (law), dissolved with a divorce judgement. On the death of her partner, ...

Marysia take care of it. However, problems arise for both his fellow town-dwellers and the local authorities.

Cast

* Jerzy Stuhr as Zygmunt Sawicki *

Anna Dymna Anna Dymna (née Dziadyk ) (born 20 July 1951) is a Polish TV, film and theatre actress. Foundress of a charity foundation Mimo Wszystko (Against the Odds). Career Anna Dymna intended to study psychology before she decided to take an entrance ex ...

as Marysia Sawicka * Andrzej Franczyk as Bank Manager * Dominika Bednarczyk as Bank Clerk 1 * Błażej Wójcik as Bank Clerk 2 * Stanisław Banaś as Fire Chief * Krzysztof Gluchowski as Mayor * Feliks Szajnert as Drunkard

Production

The film was shot in the following locations:

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

Tymbark Tymbark is a village in southern Poland, some 80 km south-east of Kraków, population 2,400 (2004 data). It lies approximately west of Limanowa and south-east of the regional capital Kraków. Tymbark was granted city rights in 1357 by Ki ...

Myślenice Myślenice is a town in southern Poland, situated in the Lesser Poland Voivodeship (since 1999), previously in Kraków Voivodeship (1975–1998). Population: 20,261 (2007). The town is divided into six districts. One of them, Zarabie, is a popu ...

Rabka Rabka may refer to the following places: * Rabka, Tibet, a village in China * Rabka-Zdrój Rabka-Zdrój (, in Goral dialects: ''Robka'', colloquially: ''Rabka'') is a spa town in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, Poland. It is located between Kraków an ...

Awards

On 8 July 2000, the film was first released at the 35th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, where it won the Special Jury Prize, in tie with ''

Peppermint Candy ''Peppermint Candy'' () is a 1999 South Korean drama film by Lee Chang-dong, his second. The film opens with the implied suicide of the protagonist and uses reverse chronology to depict some of the key events of the past 20 years of his life th ...

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Home media

After distributing 35mm prints to theaters,

Milestone Films Milestone Film and Video is an independent film distribution company, founded in 1990 in the United States by Dennis Doros and Amy Heller. The company researches and distributes cinematographic material from around the world, including silent film, ...

released the film on DVD in 2003.

Festivals

* AFI Fest 2000: The American Film Institute Los Angeles International Film Festival (International Competition) October 19–26, 2000. * Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (in competition) July 5–15, 2000. *

London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival founded in 1957 and held in the United Kingdom, running for two weeks in October with co-operation from the British Film Institute. It screens more than 300 films, documentaries and sho ...

(Cinema Europa) November 1–16, 2000. *

San Francisco International Film Festival The San Francisco International Film Festival (abbreviated as SFIFF), organized by the San Francisco Film Society, is held each spring for two weeks, presenting around 200 films from over 50 countries. The festival highlights current trends in i ...

April 19 - May 3, 2001. *

Sydney Film Festival The Sydney Film Festival is an annual competitive film festival held in Sydney, Australia, usually over 12 days in June. A number of awards are given, the top one being the Sydney Film Prize. the festival's director is Nashen Moodley. Histo ...

June 8–22, 2001.

References

External links

* *
''Big Animal''
at

{{DEFAULTSORT:Big Animal 2000 films Polish drama films 2000s Polish-language films Films about camels Films shot in Poland Films with screenplays by Krzysztof Kieślowski