24/06/2013 - In her second film, Kasia Roslaniec returns to explore the commodification of bodies and the drift towards consumerism experienced by Poland’s disoriented youth

Natalia is 17 years old, and she has a pronounced taste for fashion, nights out and boys. She’s an adolescent like any other, except for one tiny detail: Antek. Antek has a sharp sense of style, a well-stocked wardrobe and piercing eyes. But Antek is only 7 months old. It’s a young age, but he already has solid experience of shopping, camera flashes and nights out with girlfriends. Antek is the son that Natalia had on a whim in order to fill the huge void left by an elusive and soon-to-be entirely lacking maternal love.

Katarzyna Roslaniec’s film, Baby Blues, which won the Crystal Bear in the Berlinale’s Generation 14plus competition and which is now screening in competition within the 11th Brussels Film Festival, opens with a banal, teen-movie scene revolving around two perfectly styled adolescents. But their flirting comes to an abrupt end when Natalia accuses Kuba of being involved with another girl. Kuba has been betrayed by his phone, like so many before him, on which Natalia finds a suspicious message: it’s not easy to flirt in peace in this era of mobile phones. Kuba didn’t choose to have Antek and initially he thinks Natalia’s pregnancy is an accident but, ultimately, he’s fairly accepting of the child, even though he doesn’t shoulder the responsibilities that come with it. Natalia doesn’t intend to be crushed by parental responsibilities either, but when her mother abandons her and Antek in the family apartment under the fallacious pretext of an unmissable professional opportunity, Natalia finds herself trapped. To begin with, Kuba tries to help her as best he can, between joints and days spent skateboarding, but his parents soon put pay to his commitment, encouraging him to prioritise his studies. Natalia subsequently turns to the wrong crowd, thinking she’ll find allies to earn a living and raise her son. Unsurprisingly, she makes wrong choice after wrong choice, until she makes one too many, dragging her son down with her amidst recklessness, superficiality and artificial paradises. She had him to prove she could do better than her own mother, but Antek turns out to be a pretty inconvenient toy which she loses interest in far faster than a shiny new smartphone.

Katarzyna Roslaniec paints an artifice-laden portrait of Poland’s lost youth, caught up in a tide of consumerism. A thousand leagues from the grey buildings they’re growing up in, they allow themselves to be transported by the garish colours in trendy shops, the draw of notoriety and the saturated bass pumped out by their favourite DJs. Baby Blues sees Roslaniec ploughing the same furrow as with Mall Girls, which painted a disillusioned portrait of young Poles who sold their bodies in order to fill their pockets and trail around Warsaw’s shopping centres. The commodification of bodies is also present in Baby Blues, where the child becomes a commodity (practically) like any other, a fashion accessory if not an icon. The moral of the story is uncompromising, fully undermining the main character for whom redemption seems impossible. Baby Blues leave us with a bitter taste in our mouths rather than a sense of hope, like a nightmare-esque episode of Gossip Girl transposed to a flashy yet impoverished Poland.

Just like Mall Girls, Baby Blues has struck a strong chord with Polish audiences, attracting upwards of 400,000 viewers.

(Translated from French)