A Short Film About Love

Tomek, a nineteen-year-old who works at a post office, lives alone in a drab apartment block and passes his evenings watching Magda, a woman in her thirties who lives across the courtyard. She is an artist with an active social and romantic life, and he observes her through a telescope, first out of curiosity and then out of something closer to love. When the two finally meet, Magda's reaction to his confession is harsh, and the encounter pushes both of them into territory neither expected, revealing how much they share beneath the surface.

Krzysztof Kieślowski directed and co-wrote the film with Krzysztof Piesiewicz, working from material he had also developed for his Dekalog series. It is the fourth of the thirteen films he directed, following Blind Chance and preceding A Short Film About Killing. Grażyna Szapołowska plays Magda and Olaf Lubaszenko plays Tomek, with Stefania Iwińska, Piotr Machalica, Artur Barciś and Stanisław Gawlik in supporting roles. Ryszard Chutkowski produced.

The film holds an 8.1 rating on IMDb from around 28,000 votes and a 7.8 on TMDB from roughly 431 votes, while critics give it 8.1 from 22 reviews. Audience and critical responses therefore sit closely together, and the large gap in vote counts between the two audience platforms reflects how differently they are used in Poland and internationally.