30/01/2026

“Notes of a Mortal” in cinemas from today

In Maciej Żak’s latest film Notes of a Mortal, a subtle blend of irony and magical realism leads us into the inner world of fifty-year-old F.P., who, struggling with a growing sense of hopelessness and inherited sadness, attempts to depart on his own terms.

Fifty-year-old F.P. (Ireneusz Czop) arrives at a seaside resort. He is not looking for rest or a break from everyday life. He comes with a final intention: he wants to end his life. From the outside his situation appears orderly and secure – he has a family, money and professional standing. Inside, however, apathy, burnout and a sense of complete meaninglessness are building up. When he begins to write a farewell letter to his wife, the ghost of his father (Marian Dziędziel), who himself took his own life, appears in his room and now tries to dissuade his son from his decision. This unusual dialogue is suspended between memory, hallucination and something like a metaphysical encounter with his own future.

The distributor announces the film as “the story of a man who went to commit suicide but didn’t make it because they killed him, and in fact it was an accident.” This perverse formula captures the tension between the hero’s plan and the intervention of fate. The story unfolds in the space of an abandoned resort of almost postcard beauty, where the calm seascape contrasts with the inner disintegration of a man. As was written on film.org.pl after the festival screenings, “the Polish sea was photographed in such a way that you can almost feel the breeze and the smell of iodine.”

Maciej Żak’s film does not approach the subject of suicide in a solemn, pathetic tone. Instead of literalness and flaunting suffering, there is a focus on introspection, relationships and the small absurdities of everyday life. The story is capable of turning toward grotesque and black comedy. The director and screenwriter offers the viewer humour infused with decadence and existential emptiness, a kind of ironic defence against despair. This tone allows one to see that depression does not always have the face of tears and helplessness; it can be a mask of jokes, distance and apparent good spirits.

Critics have pointed to this unobvious combination. “A serious subject such as suicide has been presented in a not entirely serious way – a surprising combination that nevertheless works, intrigues and leaves the viewer with thoughts. All supported by a strong cast and visual side,” we read in film.org.pl. In turn, a review in Movieway stressed that this is “a story not so much about suicide as about crushing hopelessness regardless of what one does. About inherited sadness, confusion and a certain determination to do something on one’s own terms. Magical realism, black comedy and the excellent duo of Ireneusz Czop and Marian Dziędziel.”

The relationship between the son and the appearing father is one of the strongest elements of the drama’s construction. The father does not play the role of a moraliser or a bogeyman; he is a shadow of the past and a reproach of conscience in which the protagonist sees a possible continuation of his own story. This dialogue gives the narrative both an intimate and symbolic dimension, leading to a confrontation with the inherited experience of loss and despair.

In one interview Maciej Żak spoke about the starting point of his story: “The subject of suicide has long fascinated me as one of the most serious and most fundamental issues of human existence. I wanted to tell the story of a mature man who, with full awareness, decides to end his life, but fate has prepared a different scenario for him. From a philosophical point of view it is an act of freedom – the moment when a person can make an absolutely autonomous decision. However, it is also a problem of enormous social importance that is slowly coming to light. It is enough to look at the statistics, which show that it is men who most often decide to take this final step” (“Dziennik”, Piotr Kozłowski).

The message outlined in this way leads to a story about emptiness rather than about death itself. Depression is shown as a state of hollowing out, in which everything that once had weight loses its meaning. The viewer has a chance to see that a person in crisis is not merely “sad”, but often internally emptied, as if something inside were absorbing successive areas of life while normality continues on the outside.

At the same time, the story does not offer simple answers. It “asks dangerous questions and answers them with laughter” (Interia.pl, Łukasz Maciejewski). Elsewhere the Interia reviewer emphasises that Notes of a Mortal is “a different kind of cinema, bold yet friendly to the viewer (…) a film that, also thanks to the actors, is fascinating and ambiguous.” This ambiguity creates space for reflection instead of a moral lesson.

On the acting level the film rests on a distinctive duo. The relationship between Ireneusz Czop and Marian Dziędziel “grabs you by the throat without the need for big words” (moviesroom.pl, Mikołaj Lipkowski). They are accompanied by Magdalena Popławska (as F.P.’s wife), who completes the portrait of the hero’s family background, and Agata Turkot (the receptionist), able to make her presence felt even in shorter scenes. Critics stressed that the whole is supported by “excellent acting and music, creating a compact and well-thought-out construction” (“Sens”, Magda Kuydowicz).

The cast also includes Magdalena Boczarska and Paweł Tomaszewski. The juxtaposition of well-known faces of Polish cinema with an intimate narrative focused on inner experience creates a contrast between the recognisability of the actors and the loneliness of the protagonist.

Maciej Żak directed the film from his own screenplay. As Łukasz Maciejewski wrote: “His creative path so far, from ‘Ławeczka’, through ‘Supermarket’, ‘Rozmowy nocą’, ‘Konwój’ to ‘Notes of a Mortal’, forms an interesting trajectory of a filmmaker who feels the film genre, yet always uses that genre costume to tell something of his own, private, contradicting the structure of the genre he employs” (Interia.pl). In this sense the new film fits into a series of authorial attempts to work with convention as a tool for telling personal stories.

The world premiere took place at the Warsaw Film Festival, where the picture met with a very good reception, and today it enters cinemas across Poland. Notes of a Mortal is a proposal for viewers seeking ambiguous stories that “force reflection and do not leave one indifferent” (Onet.pl). The film does not aspire to be a manifesto or a closed diagnosis. It points rather to the experience of helplessness and the need for conversation about a subject still burdened by taboo.

Notes of a Mortal does not shy away from the weight of the issue, but speaks about it in an accessible and at times ironic language. Thanks to this, the story about the boundary between life and death becomes a story about relationships, memory and confrontation with one’s emotional inheritance. The viewer is left with the image of a man facing an absolute decision whose meaning is undermined by accident, encounter and the returning past.

The cinema release opens the way to a broad conversation about a film that – as was written after the first screenings – “works, intrigues and leaves the viewer with thoughts” (film.org.pl), while at the same time “answers dangerous questions with laughter” (Interia.pl, Łukasz Maciejewski).

Notes of a Mortal
dir. Maciej Żak
premiere: 30 January 2026