All language subtitles for Dekalog VIII ENG

Good morning.

Good morning.

Are you going away
or coming back so early?

I'm coming back.

I took the night train
from Szczecin

Gee, madam.

Ah, I see you've made a good deal.

A series.

Showing the German flight
to the North Pole

of 1931. The Polarfahrt.

A Zeppelin, I guess?

Three of them. They're great.

You must show them to me one day.

Well, good... bye.

I'll be glad to show them to you.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Good morning, professor.

The dean would like to
speak to you.

Come on in, please.

This is Mrs. Elzbieta Loranz
from New York.

We've already met. In the states.

Do I remember well?

You translated my works
didn't you?

Hearty all of them.

Your Polish is perfect! And to
think I've been breaking my

You did very well.

Yes. Mrs. Lorans is here
on scientific exchange.

She's interested in your works
professor.

If I got her right

she'd like to attend your classes.

That will be a pleasure for me.

Do you want to come today?

If I may.

Will you excuse me?

Mrs. Elzbieta Loranz

works at the American institute

for investigation of the fates of
Jews rescued from the

Well, let's continue our subject
The moral inferno.

Who'd like speak first?

We already have two
political stories to consider

And one related to the customs,

To simplify matters. Yes?

Let's imagine
the following situation.

A man is dying of cancer. This is
the third case of cancer

He is tread by
an excellent specialist

who's a believing Christian
by the way.

It's important.

Well, the doctor happened to live
in the same house

as the patient and his wife

The wife starts
pestering the doctor

She wants to know
whether her husband will die.

And when.

But the doctor can't tell her that.

To him, it's like
passing a death sentence.

As a believer he can't do it.

But the patient's wife
grows more and more intrusive.

The doctor suspects her of
having special reasons

that make her insist on his answer.

It appears he's right

the woman is pregnant.

It's another man's baby.

The husband doesn't know.

What's more, she couldn't
get pregnant before.

She loves her unborn baby

but she also loves her husband.

If he's going to live
she'll have a abortion.

If he dies, she can have her baby

The doctor is to decide that baby's
life whether he likes

He's aware of that.

I know how the story ended.

Warsaw's a small town.

To make things
more difficult for you,

I might add the baby's alive.

Which is perhaps the most
important element of the story

Excuse me, I can't make the
recording from that distance.

I said the baby was alive.

And that I considered that fact
the most important element...

I'd like you to define

the characters and motives
of the hero of that story.

It's going to be
the more interesting

as we both know the archetypes

Though actually, I believe you

know different archetypes than I do

Yes, madam.

Thank you

Anybody else
wants to say something?

No? Let us therefore
analyse the previous stories.

Yes, madam?

You said the baby's life
was paramount, didn't you?

Yes

indeed.

It just occurred to me...

If I'm allowed to take an active
part in the class, that

But of course, all those present
have equal rights

I'd like to tell you
about an event

We'll be glad to hear you.

I'm afraid it has a week
point for you...

it happened in the pass.

But then, it also has
an advantage: It's true

Does what I said
about the baby's life

matter to you specially?

Yes, it does. To some extent.

It's the year 1943. February.

The winter.

The heroine is a girl of six
A Jewish girl

kept in a basement of a house
in the neighborhood.

But she can't stay there any longer

The girl's father is in the ghetto.

His friends try to
find a new place for her.

The place is found,

but her future guardians
pose a condition:

The girl must have
an official certificate of baptism

It's a cold evening
The girl visits a married couple

who have agreed to
be her godparents.

They are Catholics, and young.

The girl's frozen,

she has spent all day
getting through the city

with her guardian
to reach this flat

Well, she now goes in,

accompanied by that guardian.

The husband seems nervous
The wife is calm.

They serve hot tea
The girl wants that tea very much

but there isn't time.

The priest's waiting
and the Curfew's near.

But the woman
who should start getting dressed

asks them to sit down inside.

Sorry.

Get out of here.

Please go out.

Thank you.

You said it was in 1943?

Yes. In february.

In Warsaw?

Yes. In the distant parts on
Mokotow district. In Odynoa

Yes? What happened next?

Next? Ah, yes.

They sat at the table.

The man kept walking
round the table

They looked at one another

And at last the woman
made up her mind

to say things that were
so very difficult to say.

They can't keep their promise

Having considered everything

They cannot lie to the one
they believe in.

He does demand them
to be charitable,

but forbids to
give false testimony.

The lie they had planned to commit

knowing what cause it
serve proved reconcilable

with their moral principles
after all.

That's it.

Then, the guardian and the girl
rise from the table.

"Have some more tea"
the woman says.

The girl takes a sip

But then she
glances at her guardian

and puts the glass down.

And then, downstairs at gateway

the girl notices her guardian

"it's Curfew soon", she says

But the guardian doesn't move

Was there any body else
in that flat?

Yes. An elderly gentleman

He was sitting with his back
to the rest

in a wheelchair, I believe

Do you know any details?

The tea cups were
good quality china

But didn't match one another

There was a green kerosene lamp
on the table but it was out.

The man never took his hand
out of his trouser pocket

during the two or three minutes
of the conversation.

These are all the detail

Any questions?

None?

Maybe doubts?

Yes?

The motivation seems
improbable to me

if that married couple
were really Catholics.

That false testimony wouldn't be
directed against their

This is the only motivation I know.

It seemed quite genuine
that evening.

What other motives were possible?

How do you think?

I don't know
I can't understand that.

I don't know motives which would
justify a decision like

Yes?

Fear

Imagine another Jewish child
had been discovered in the

Just an hour before

and his head smashed
against the railing,

And the family that had kept him

executed in the backyard
It could have been fear.

Yes. Fear, yes.

Is fear a justification to you?

I've just suggested
a possible motive

I haven't said...

We're going too far.

Please consider the moral problems

that emerge from that story
as your homework.

As for you, try and present

an acceptable point of view
that woman.

Try and understand her.

That's all, thank you.

It wasn't in Mokotow district.

No.

It happened down town.

In Noakowskiego street.

Yes.

So it's you

Yes. It's me

And you're alive.

I kept thinking, all those years

Whenever I saw anybody playing
with a golden chalet

I said to myself

oh God. You're alive.

A chance family in Praga district
agreed to give me shelter.

Some relatives of the person
who brought me to you

They were moonshiners,

I spent two years
next to a mash tub.

They're with me in America now

The man's already dead, actually

And you've come here
to look at my face

while you tell your story?

I wanted to tell you
who I was back in the states

I tried to write you a letter

Several letters

And to come here

If it hadn't been for
those few words about that baby

I'd never have...

Yes. I see.

You know, some say a person
who rescues another person

has special features...

The same concerns the one
who has to be rescued

Yes. I believe there are
such special features

And you have them.

I have them?

Yes. The things you did afterwards
are well known.

Several of my nationals
owe their lives to you

Funny, The girl sensed

the falsity of that ostensibly
catholic reasoning straight

The ash... tray's over there.

You don't smoke.

But I see things.

Where are you staying?
Shall I give you a lift?

I remember you once drove me
all through New York.

I have a room in "Victoria"
About 300 meters from here

Not too good for return service.

Perhaps you'd like to
have supper with me?

Is this where you live?

No.

But this is the house.

Yes

It's in this very gateway
that you said,

"let's go, it's Curfew soon"

Elzbieta!

Elzbieta?

What's all this stir about?

I didn't hear it ring

I once...

Sorry. I'm looking for a woman.

There hasn't been
one here for ages

But there are several families
living in this flat?

Five of them.

You must ring the bell for
each of them separately.

We don't like one another too much

Is this about the advertisement?
Come in, please.

No. I'm looking for my friend

She entered this staircase.

A tall woman, black hair

Come in.

I'm looking for my friend...

Come on, stop it
Come in.

Excuse me
Is there another entrance?

Is it about the advertisement?
No

There's no other entrance
It's a respectable house.

My friend went it through
this gateway.

About the advertisement?
No. And she never came back.

This means she didn't
go in after all.

But she did.

Elzbieta?

Elzbieta

Oh god. I've been looking for you

I'm here

I was frightened for a moment

I thought you'd never
been here at all.

But I am.

It's a horrible place.

I went to my former flat.

That right my father's friend
could not think what to do

right here.

Is was then that I decided
I'd never be afraid again.

Why didn't you come here
all those forty years?

Didn't you want to see this place?

No. It's humiliating.

Being helped by others?

Yes. One doesn't like to meet the
witnesses of one's own

Even if those witnesses
are only houses.

All right, we investigate
analyse and describe...

but how could this injustice
be abolished?

Why can some be rescuers
while others are the rescued only?

Do you know why?

No. I don't.

Let's go.

A nice flat.

I'm on a diet, you see

I didn't expect anybody to supper.

The woman I remember

couldn't have changed
into a person like you.

But it did happen.

You frightened me

Back there in Noakowskiego street.

I'm sorry.

If you made all this trip
of several thousand kilometers

hoping for a mystery

You're going to be disappointed.

The reasons why I had to
Get rid of you

That night are arrived.

The impact that night had on my
life is quite another problem

But let's forget it

The man who walk round the room

with a hand in his pocket
was my husband

He died in 1952

I know.

He was a home army officer
in those days.

We had been informed that

the family who were to take you
were agents of the Gestapo

Through yourself
your guardian and the priest

the Gestapo would then get to us

To the underground organization

That could have been
a possible give... away channel

And that's the whole mystery.

Yes. It's very simple.

Later it appeared that
the information about

that family was false

But they were nearly executed
by the underground.

Are you believed.

That's only natural

And you lived forty years
with that certainty,

and I didn't ever know
you were alive.

I left you all along

I sent you to what was
a nearly certain death

And I knew what I was doing

Yes, you're right.

No idea, no thought, nothing

can be more important that
the life of a child

What do you tell your students?

About how they should live.

I don't tell them anything.

I'm there to help them
reach their own conclusions.

Why?

It's the right that matters.

It does exist

I believe it exist in all man

A situation can release either
the right or the wrong

That evening released
no right in myself.

Who's the one to evaluate it?

The one who's inside all of us.

I never noticed a mention
about God in your works.

I'm not a church...

I don't use the word "God"

But you don't need words
to be sure

Men is free

Free to choose.

He can leave god behind

if he likes.

And what can then replace God?

Loneliness, in this world.

And afterwards. Try to get to
the bottom of this problem

If there's nothing
but emptiness afterwards

In that case

Yes. I know that.

I'm sorry.

May I?
Come in, please.

Oh, I thought you were alone.

God evening, madam.

I just wanted to show you...

Beautiful. Really beautiful.

Sorry to trouble you

If you happen to see your son
please tell him about them.

He was always most interested
in such things.

I will.

Polarfahrt. Three Zeppelins. 1931

Right. Well, good night.

Good night

And thank you.

A stamp... collector?

More than that, I think

You know, he sometimes
shows those stamps to me

like others
show their grandchildren

or pictures of their children

He was wearing a sweater
Looked alike a neighbor

A neighbor, yes. Know what?

That doctor and patient
we talked about during the class

also live in this house.

Well, an interesting house.

Like any other one.

In all houses, in all flats,

some people. And so on, and so on.

Exactly.

Thank you

Do those people
The ones I was to go to.

Do you know them?

Yes, if that's
what you want to know.

Could I meet them?

Would you like to?

All right
I'll take you there tomorrow

It's a small tailor's shop
in Praga district.

But I'm not going in.

I only saw them once after the war.

I said, "I'm sorry".

That was all I could say.

But it wasn't enough.

Would you like to stay here
for the night?

I have another room.

Very few people like to
stay there nowadays.

Do you like it, madam?

Do you like it?

What are you doing?

They've got a favorite on TV.

I want to show them I'm even better

See? That was rubber stand
He can't do that.

How do you do it?

Anybody can do it
It's a matter of practice.

Bend backwards.

A bit more. No, you can't.

It's too late now.

You won't learn it. I'm sorry.

Will you have breakfast with me?

Something more than just 50 grams
of cottage cheese

on the fifteenth days of the diet

Coffee without sugar.

All right.

I get up early, just like you.

All right

But he doesn't live here, does he?

No. He doesn't want to stay with me

Did you buy these flowers?

Yes. I noticed you
put fresh flowers on the table.

Thank you.

Where is he?

To be brief. He's far away from me.

It's here. I'll do some shopping

and come back here to fetch you.

Yes, madam?

I'd like to talk to you.

To me?

What about?

I'm Elzbieta Loranz.

I don't know you, madam.

I know we never actually met.

But we were to meet during the war
I was to live...

No, wait a minute.

I don't want to talk about the war.

Or about what happened
after the war.

Not even about today.

I can make you a nice dress
coat, or maybe a suit.

Just decide on that cut.

Here you are

You were to save my life

I'd like to thank you for
being prepared to do it

Got your own length of cloth?

You see, it's so difficult
to buy anything nowadays

I was six years old then
I was in February of 1943

Yes, I was twenty-two

Well? A coat?

These fashion magazines
are very old

Would you be offended if
I send you something more recent

No, I got this one from abroad, too
But it was many years

Afterwards, there was no opportunity

And you aren't going to
talk with me?

No

I didn't to away just in case

Well, he wanted to
make a coat for me

Just what I thought

He was in great trouble
Too great a trouble perhaps

Isn't this a strange country

Did you pray yesterday?

Yes