Agata Kulesza makes hardened women understandable without making them easy company. We rate her restraint and her refusal to soften a character for our benefit; Ida gives the clearest reason to watch her.
Fi1m perspective
In Ida (2013), Agata Kulesza’s Wanda disturbs the quiet around a novice nun without overwhelming her. A pause or a glance can carry the pain; Kulesza does not need to keep demonstrating it. She is particularly good at playing women who use authority or cynicism to keep their distress out of sight. Here, she keeps the difference between the two women clear without turning their scenes into a contest.
The lead in Rose (2011) was the breakthrough, after years of theatre and supporting work in Polish film and television. International recognition followed with Ida, and Paweł Pawlikowski remains the director through whom we have seen her most clearly. Wanda gives her room to be forceful, damaged and unaccommodating, sometimes at once. The part of the Mother Superior in The Innocents (2016) places her in another position of authority, with moral torment beneath it.
Wanda’s self-destructiveness makes her an uncomfortable guide for her niece, and Kulesza refuses to soften that difficulty. We found her painful to watch because she can help Anna confront the past while seeming unable to live with it herself. The performance is strong enough to carry stretches where the women’s history could use a little more dialogue. Our reservation about Ida is that the careful framing sometimes holds us too far away; Kulesza’s willingness to be unpleasant is not something we would ask the film to correct.
Cold War (2018) reunites her with Pawlikowski as Irena Bielecka, but it is a less substantial introduction to her work. We recommend the romance for Joanna Kulig, Tomasz Kot and the music. The gaps between scenes sometimes make the lovers’ feelings harder to follow. Kulesza has continued in Polish features alongside stage work, and there is no need to treat Wanda as the limit of what she can do. Start with Ida, provided you can bear an evening with an aunt who will not make herself agreeable.
Biography
Agata Kulesza is a Polish actress who works in film, television and theatre. She graduated with distinction from the Aleksander Zelwerowicz National Academy of Dramatic Art in Warsaw in 1994.
She is known for her performances in Rose (2011), for which she received a Polish Film Award for Best Actress, Ida (2013) as Wanda, and Cold War (2018) as Irena Bielecka. Kulesza has won four Polish Film Awards in total. She is a member of the Polish Film Academy.
