Synopsis

The footloose ennui of Poland’s postwar generation is captured to perfection in this jazzy chronicle of a draft-dodger’s final day of freedom. A slacker before there was a word for it, Andrzej (played by Skolimowski himself) drifts through a series of open-ended encounters with women following a wake-up argument with his pouting wife, and a long-delayed military physical (the film’s title derives from one of the questions). Skolimowski hoarded four years’ worth of the annual film footage allotment from his Lódz film school in order to create this first feature marked by compositional bravado and a trademark air of the absurd. -Barbara Scharres, Gene Siskel Film Center