Directors Guild Issues Statement in Support of Agnieszka Holland Amid Polish Government Backlash
The Directors Guild of America has joined the growing international show of solidarity for Agnieszka Holland, who has faced backlash from a member of Poland’s right-wing government over her new film, refugee drama Green Border.
In a statement issued on Thursday, the DGA said it wanted to echo the support shown to Holland from institutions in Europe, adding that the director played “vital role” in sparking debate and bringing to light issues in society.
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“The Directors Guild of America champions creative expression through the art of filmmaking and decries the recent attacks by the Polish justice minister and extremists on our member director Agnieszka Holland for her depictions of the brutality faced by refugees to Poland in her film The Green Border,” the statement said. “We firmly believe directors like Agnieszka have a vital role to play in fostering discussion and reflecting societal problems through their work. We echo the statements by the Federation of European Screen Directors (FERA) and the European Film Academy in support of Agnieska and her Venice Film Festival award-winning film and will continue to support the free speech rights of all directors.”
Green Border dramatizes the situation faced by migrants from North Africa and the Middle East who were lured to the Belarus-Poland border by propaganda promising easy passage into the European Union. Instead, they became pawns in a geopolitical game after the Polish government shut down the border, leaving them stranded and starving in the swampy, treacherous forests between the two countries. The film premiered in competition in Venice, where it won a special jury prize, with The Hollywood Reporter calling it a “devastating dramatic triumph” in its review.
After the premiere, however, Holland came under attack from the Polish government, with Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro comparing the movie, and its depiction of Polish border guards, to “Nazi propaganda.”
“In the Third Reich, the Germans produced propaganda films showing Poles as bandits and murderers. Today they have Agnieszka Holland for that,” Ziobro wrote on X (formerly known as Twitter).
In an open letter published earlier this week, the Federation of European Screen Directors said it was “full of admiration” for Holland for her “strength and courage in the face of the appalling attacks against her and the film in Poland,” adding that it stood “squarely behind Agnieszka.”
The group, which represents more than 20,000 European film and TV directors, said that Ziobro had made his remarks “without watching the film, making such comments not only slanderous and unfounded but cloaked in the trappings of a government minister his words become an insidious form of propaganda.”
The Venice Film Festival jury, in contrast, “assessed the evidence before making their decision — they watched the film. All of it.”
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