User Reviews

"The Four Seasons" (1985) is about two brothers and a woman who live in nature and are fascinated by it and far away from the city. The older brother and the woman are living together. The younger brother appears to be visiting. They are building a cottage for their sick father. He and his aged wife arrive and the brothers try to bring him back to life. The brothers build a portable chair to carry him in and show him a chubby naked woman nearby who bathes in a stream. This perks him up some. They also build wooden handrails for him to practice walking. Fall and winter come. The father dies. The older brother practices how to walk between the rails wondering if he'll manage when he gets old.

I revisited Vojtech Jasný's Desire (1958) few days back on the occasion of his death anniversary and i couldn't help thinking that it would make a special triple-bill with this little gem The Four Seasons/Cztery Pory Roku (1984) and Latvian Masterpiece Puika (1977) by Aivars Freimanis. I feel all these films flawlessly sustain a visual poetry in a balanced way. My favourite Kondratiuk movie will be Pelnia (1979) and Hydrozagadka (1970). I know few of his film is like a take stock of his life, he presents himself to the audience. Look at The Sundial Clock (1997), Stardust (1982) and The Spinning Wheel of Time (1995) which features his usual tropes interweaving mankind, time, fauna and flora. In "Cztery pory roku" filmmaker Andrzej Kondratiuk along with real-life wife Iga Cembrzynska reconnects with mother earth in Gzowo, a village in Poland where they share many tender moments. Nothing really happens, it is the simplest thing that life has to offer. It's just everyday life attuned to the in-between moments of existence which includes taking care of family and director's sick father.

Final thoughts, It is a mix of homemovie, documentary, and fiction filmmaking with a dash of the sublime and the mundane, with layered themes. Honestly it is a very hard sell for an average moviegoer but I'd still suggest everyone to see it atleast once. I even suggest you to add the following titles - Nina Hedenius's Gubben i stugan/The Old Man in the Cottage (1996), Sumiko Haneda's The Cherry Tree with Gray Blossoms (1977) and Alice Rohrwache's Four Roads (2020).