If you want to produce a travelogue without travel, take note, for this is a masterclass by Indian filmmaker Arjun Talwar. He barely leaves a single street – Warsaw’s Wolf Street – in his adopted Poland yet delivers an extraordinary insight into Polish culture while at the same time enabling the viewer to peer over his shoulder at his immigration experience.
I’ve never been to Warsaw but I recognise Wolf Street for its similarities to the street where I grew up, in Berlin some 550km to the west. These are streets where life is played out on balconies, in backyards, and in front of graffitied tenement facades, where the gruff demeanours of working-class people hide deadpan wit and the melancholy of having lived through dark times be it WWII or communism.
These are Talwar’s neighbours too. All friendly enough – once you make the effort – but barriers abound. In interviews at the local butchers, convenience store, and bar, there’s talk of community life dying and neighbours now ignoring each other – not like in the old days. But Talwar’s challenge is exacerbated by being an immigrant – part of Poland’s recent wave of Ukrainians, Russians, Turks, Nepalese, Syrians, and Georgians.
Whereas I watched Turkish and Arab immigrants settle into and gradually transform our Berlin neighbourhood; Talwar tells the story from the other side: the struggle to integrate (despite his mastery of Polish), facing xenophobia and the far-right in a country fearful of being overrun once more. Memories of German Nazis and Russian communists have moulded Poland’s psyche.
But the struggle is more than just acceptance into Polish society. It is also about having the determination to succeed; dealing with setbacks, uncertainty; finding your place; then coming to terms with your new identity.
Unusually and cleverly much of this is explored through Talwar’s disarming central role in his own documentary, though he never loses sight of his mission to engagingly document his street.
Every street should have someone documenting it, he suggests. And if ever there was an inspiration to look closely and creatively at your everyday immediate surroundings and bond with your neighbours then this is it. You might well be surprised by all the cultural fragments, contradictions, and relationships that await – but perhaps you need to be an immigrant to really see all this?
Letters from Wolf Street appeared at the RIDM which continues until November 30. Tickets and info on films can be found HERE.
