The second film of the trio took place in Thailand. To set up the story, two screens' worth of text told us about the sacred puppet theater in Thailand, whose practitioners are revered and wealthy. On the other end of the scale are the actors who perform the same stories with costumes on real actors, who often covet the puppets. The puppets are said to be imbued with the spirits of their creators, and will bring a curse upon anyone other than their creator who uses them. The film is about a theater performer who obtains one of the puppets and the misfortunes that befall him. I wasn't terribly impressed with the film, it reminded me a little of Kipling's "The Monkey's Paw", but aside from great production value (which all three films had), it wasn't anything spectacularly wonderful.

I found the third film to be incredibly compelling. In it, a police officer and his young son move into a nearly abandoned apartment complex, where only one other family lives--a man, his paralyzed wife, and their young daughter. After his son disappears, the officer goes to the man's apartment to look for him since the son's been playing with their daughter. The man informs him that they have no daughter, and takes him hostage in the apartment. We discover that the man has been taking care of his dead wife for three years, soaking her in Chinese herbs and talking to her every day until her tumors are gone and she revives. The policeman tries to convince him that she's dead, but he'll have none of that. Eventually, the policeman's co-workers show up, take the man away, he runs and is killed when a truck hits him. The dead woman's fingers twitch, and a single tear rolls down her face. Maybe there's something to be said for Chinese medicine? A wonderfully poignant film with very subtle touches that make "The Sixth Sense" look like a clumsy student film. Through various visual clues in the film, we realize by the end that the policeman's son is dead, as was the couple's daughter, and through the experience, the father has learned to release the memories.

The Count believes that they've drowned, but they've been hiding out with a troupe of Italian actors and acrobats. Twenty years later, the Count learns that they survived and tries to have them killed. But Lagardère has different plans. Posing as a hunchbacked bookkeeper and confidante of the Count, he begins his intricate revenge from the inside.

Margit Christenses is pure brilliance in her role as the mother, and Jürgen Vogel as Jesko is absolutely incredible. The plot is intricately crafted, and the family dynamics are dead-on and wonderfully well-developed. THe dialogue was great, and photography excellent.

Edi’s and Jureczek’s lives become intertwined with the brothers’ when they hire Edi to tutor the girl. After all, a middle-aged homeless man is hardly a sexual threat. One night, with the brothers gone and Edi and Jureczek sleeping in the living room, Princess sneaks out to see her boyfriend. When the brothers discover that she’s pregnant, she accuses Edi of raping her in an effort to protect the identity of the real father. Edi doesn’t deny the charges, the brothers exact a gruesome revenge and insist that he care for the baby. Edi, Jureczek and the baby depart for the country to stay with Edi’s family where they begin raising the child.

Their idyll is abruptly when the brothers discover that Princess lied to them about the father’s identity, and in the stirring conclusion of the film, through the decisions he’s forced to make, we see Edi’s sacrifice and redemption.

Like many eastern European films, “Edi” slow-paced, giving the viewer a wonderful opportunity to discover the characters, to really understand their lives, passions and motivations. Though at times some plot elements seem contrived or unrealistic, they ultimately become essential to our understanding of the people in the richly complex character study.

Henryk Golebiewski, playing Edi, is wonderfully subtle in his portrayal of a middle-aged man who’s fallen upon hard times and is only doing the best he can with his circumstances, and give one of the best performances in contemporary European cinema.

Piotr Trzaskalski’s feature film debut is a masterfully crafted story about what we, as humans hold onto when all our hope is gone. The film explores how mistakes and bad decisions can lead to more noble outcomes when the when we hold on to our humanity despite the tribulations that we’re facing. Ultimately, it’s that humanity that saves us.