Film Region – Kujawy Pomorze: Ewa Braun and Magnus von Horn in Lipno

Lipno will once again become a meeting place for cinema enthusiasts and filmmakers. The 19th “Pola and Others” Film Review, organised by the Pola Negri Lipno Cultural Society, will take place from 18 to 20 September 2026. This year’s recipients of the festival’s “Politka” statuette will be Ewa Braun and Magnus von Horn. The Kujawy Pomorze Film Fund is a partner of the event.

The “Pola and Others” review is one of the most important film events held in the Kujawsko-Pomorskie region. The festival has been organised since 2007 and draws on the remarkable history of Lipno as the birthplace of Pola Negri – Barbara Apolonia Chałupiec, one of the greatest stars of silent cinema. The festival celebrates the artist’s legacy while also showcasing contemporary Polish cinema and filmmakers whose work crosses borders. “Pola and Others” is more than just film screenings. Traditionally, the programme combines cinema, music and meetings with filmmakers. Another important element of the festival is the “Politka” award, presented to artists whose achievements and international careers echo the phenomenon of Pola Negri. Previous recipients have included Karolina Gruszka, Agnieszka Grochowska, Joanna Kulig, Izabela Miko, Agata Buzek, Daniel Olbrychski, Andrzej Seweryn, Marcin Dorociński and Jerzy Maksymiuk.

One of this year’s recipients will be Ewa Braun, an outstanding Polish production designer, set decorator and costume designer. A graduate in art history from the University of Warsaw, she has worked on around 60 feature films and television series. During her career, she has collaborated with such directors as Andrzej Wajda, Krzysztof Kieślowski, Krzysztof Zanussi, Agnieszka Holland, Janusz Majewski and Volker Schlöndorff. Her credits include productions such as Illumination, Camouflage, C.K. Deserters, Queen Bona, Europa Europa and Jakob the Liar. Braun’s greatest international success came with her work on Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List. In 1994, she received the Academy Award for Best Art Direction together with Allan Starski. The film won seven Oscars that year, and the award for Braun and Starski remains one of the most significant distinctions in the history of Polish participation in American cinema. Braun is also an academic lecturer associated, among others, with the Łódź Film School. In 2025, she received the Platinum Lions Award for lifetime achievement at the Polish Film Festival in Gdynia. On 8 September, Ewa Braun will unveil her star on the Łódź Walk of Fame.

The second recipient of this year’s “Politka” award will be Magnus von Horn, a Swedish-born director and screenwriter who has been closely associated with Poland for many years. He is a graduate of the Łódź Film School, where he also teaches. His work often focuses on difficult human experiences – exclusion, loneliness, violence, social pressure and the limits of human empathy. Von Horn attracted attention with his feature-length debut The Here After in 2015. The film premiered at Cannes and earned him, among other honours, awards for directing and screenplay at the Gdynia festival. His next film, Sweat from 2020, was also selected for the official programme of the Cannes Film Festival and received the Silver Lions Award in Gdynia. His international standing was further strengthened by The Girl with the Needle from 2024, a dark drama set in Copenhagen in 1919. The film competed in the main competition at Cannes, received the Silver Lions Award in Gdynia, and won numerous other awards and nominations, including an Academy Award nomination for Best International Feature Film.

The 19th edition of the festival will begin on 18 September 2026. The programme will include films, concerts, meetings and events referring to the traditions of cinema and the atmosphere of “old Hollywood”. The highlights of the programme, however, will be the ceremonies presenting the “Politka” awards to Ewa Braun and Magnus von Horn.

Paweł Jankowski
Promotion Department

7 September 2026