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Eye For Film >> Movies >> Bread And Salt (2022) Film Review

Bread and salt.

Reviewed by: Jennie Kermode

The experience of being gay or bisexual isn’t just about falling in love or coming out, even if the plethora of films on those subjects might prompt one to think so. It is also, all too often, about silence. Fear of doing or saying the wrong thing in potentially volatile circumstances makes it easier to do or say very little. Fear of displaying the wrong emotion makes it easier to keep an emotional distance, especially in situations which one knows one won’t have to deal with for very long.

Tymek (Tymoteusz Bies) left his home town three years ago to study music in Warsaw. He’s only home for the summer, planning to go on from there to a two year scholarship in Germany. That in itself could be enough to inspire hostility in this small community where most people don’t have much ambition or much hope, and he’s careful who he discusses it with. He can at least relax iin that way around his younger brother, Jacek (played by his real life brother, Jacek Bies), as he is theoretically on the same career path, though it’s vital that he pass his next exam if he is to stay in the game. Tymek worries that Jacek is too distracted by his girlfriend, Ania. Jacek assumes that Tymek must have a girlfriend, or several, in Warsaw. They play piano together, hands on the keyboard captured in close-up, square format, intimate both physically and experientially.

Their flat, in a sprawling housing estate, is clean and bright. Their mother makes the best pierogi, they say. She keeps a pet bird. There’s a love and diligence here which explains the boys’ success. It does not extend far beyond the door. In the streets and courtyards, young people roam around, bored and listless, or sit on the kerbside drinking, smoking cigarettes, taking drugs. Other hobbies include swimming in a nearby lake or noising up the immigrants who run the recently established Namid Kebab. We see one of these men, Youssef (Nadim Suleiman), on a night bus as Tymek is travelling home with his friend Nikola. Other local boys get on board, taunt him, take his bag. Though Nikola attempts to dissuade or distract them, nobody else intervenes. Perhaps, for Tymek, the risk seems too high.

There’s a hint of flirtation between Tymek and Youssef in the kebab shop, by day, but it’s only a slight thing. Both are ground down by the weight of constant microaggressions, the local young people constantly sharing racist or homophobic attempts at humour. if you’ve been on the sharp end of such things yourself, you may find this exhausting to watch. Even if you haven’t, it’s impossible to escape the atmosphere of menace. At key moments, director Damian Kocur slows his camera right down. We drift through the estate, through the sort of spaces which an architect might have thought would look pretty, with no idea how disaffected young people would use them. There’s a continual sense that we are about to encounter an ambush. The tension keeps rising, all that pressure with nowhere to go. The end of this will not be pretty.

“Have you had bread and salt?” Tymek asks Youssef, referring to a traditional Polish welcome. In fact it’s Youssef and his colleague who have been doing all the welcoming, perhaps against their better judgement. Yet even as we are invited to sympathise with them, we see enough of their antagonists to understand that this isn’t just about individual malice – that these young people are the product of systemic decay. In one scene, one of them talks about his dad’s alcoholism, apologising when he sheds a tear and laughing it off. There is no support structure for the processing of emotion. Aggression and cruelty seem to be the only way to attain meaningful status, the only way to be sure of not becoming a target.

Most of the actors here are non-professionals. The Bies’ brothers’ experience lies mostly in their piano playing, and both deliver impressive musical performances here. Patiently tutoring the fictional Jacek, Tymek explains how a sequence of notes can speak differently depending on where emphasis is placed. This film, screening as part of the 2023 Kinoteka Polish Film Festival, seems to say something similar about the value attached to its characters.

Kinoteka Polish Film Festival 2023 takes place in venues across London, 9 March - 27 April

For further information and tickets: https://kinoteka.org.uk/

Director: Damian Kocur

Writer: Damian Kocur, Marta Konarzewska

Starring: Tymoteusz Bies, Jacek Bies, Nadim Suleiman, Nikola Raczko, Bartosz Olewinski, Dawid Piejko, Malgorzata Puzio, Wojciech Walkiewicz, Nadim Shalabi

Runtime: 100 minutes

Country: Poland

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‘Bread And Salt’: Cairo Review

By Allan Hunter 2022-11-17T08:00:00+00:00

Damian Kocur’s mature and thought-provoking debut sees a talented pianist return to the pressure cooker of his small home town

Source: IKH Pictures Promotion

‘Bread And Salt’

Dir/scr: Damian Kocur. Poland. 2022. 99mins

Bread And Salt uses individual anguish to reflect on much bigger issues in Polish society and beyond. Inspired by true events, writer/director Damian Kocur’s subtle, slow-burn debut feature tells of a young pianist returning to a home town in which little seems to have changed and blind prejudices run deep. Non-professional actors add to the authentic feel of a film that builds like a volcano preparing to erupt. Further festival interest should continue.

 Even in the heat of the moment,  Bread And Salt  is marked by its subtle, soulful approach to events

Tymek (Tymoteusz   Bies) is a student at the Warsaw Academy of Music. He returns home for the summer before heading to Germany for a two-year scholarship. Kocur sets the scene of provincial torpor. Tymek’s younger brother Jacek (played by Tymoteusz’s real life brother Jacek Bies) waits for him at a bus stop as three boys circle around on their bikes looking for something to spark their interest, or at least the offer of a cigarette.

Tymek falls in with the old gang and tries to motivate a brother who is also a talented pianist but has failed on his first attempt to get into university. There is little to do but hang out, drink beer, get stoned, try a few rap beats and let lazy days drift past. Kocur establishes a sense that Tymek may be part of the group but is now detaching from it. He is now the one who sits on the beach as others splash in the water and who never participates in any of the roughhousing. Nikola (Nikola Raczko) can sense a change. Even when they are alone, he never shows any interest in her – or, indeed, in any girl.

Kocur frames Tymek in a way that confirms his isolation. He also favours lingering close-ups in which we can watch Tymek as he observes others, taking everything in. Lead actor Tymoteusz Bies has a diffidence to him, a feeling of passivity that makes Tymek someone who could easily find himself caught up in events he cannot control. Bies is also an accomplished pianist, and the film is peppered with his performances of pieces by Chopin and Beethoven.

The one thing that has changed in the local estate is the addition of a kebab shop run by two refugees who have recently arrived in Poland. Tymek is more sympathetic than most to the owners, asking Youssef (Nadim Suleiman) if he has yet received the “bread and salt” of a traditional welcome to his country. Others treat the duo as easy targets. Frequent visits to the shop and cafe are invariably accompanied by jokes that aren’t funny, taunts, racist comments and homophobic asides.

Tymek tries to make his difference felt. There is a hint of a friendship or perhaps something more with Youssef. It is only a hint. however; Tymek mostly goes along with the crowd, disappearing when things turn heated. He doesn’t engage in any of the verbal or physical abuse, but he doesn’t call it out either. In one scene, Youssef is on a bus at night. Polish lads challenge him, taunt him and steal his backpack. Some passengers express their distate with a disapproving glance or an exasperated sight, but nobody intervenes. Tymek sits quietly, and only Nikola dares to reprimand the assailants. 

There is a sense throughout the film of growing unease. Youssef and his fellow refugee display the patience of saints but even saints will eventually retaliate to  relentless abuse. There is an echo of Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing as a neighbourhood prepares for violence. Yet even in the heat of the moment, Bread And Salt is marked by its subtle, soulful approach to events. Nothing is explicit, and Damian Kocur trusts the audience to work some things out for themselves. It makes for a mature and thought-provoking first feature. 

Production companies: Munk Studio, Canal+ Poland

International sales: IKH Pictures Promotion  [email protected]

Producers: Jacek Bromski, Ewa Jastrzebska, Jerzy Kapuscinski

Screenplay: Damian Kocur, Marta Konarzewska

Cinematography:  Tomasz Wozniczka

Production design:  Ewa Mroczkowska

Editing: Alan Zejer

Main cast: Tymoteusz Bies, Jacek Bies, Nikola Raczko, Nadim Suleiman

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‘Violence Often Starts With a Joke’: Damian Kocur Talks ‘Bread and Salt,’ Teases ‘A Night Without an End’ (EXCLUSIVE)

By Marta Balaga

Marta Balaga

• Tomas Alfredson Stands by Decision to Turn Bergman-Penned ‘Faithless’ Into Series: ‘It Would Be Different if I Remade “The Seventh Seal”’ 2 weeks ago
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• Poland’s Damian Kocur Follows ‘Bread and Salt’ With Ukraine-Centered ‘Under the Volcano,’ Debuts Trailer: ‘It Was Important to Mark My Solidarity’ (EXCLUSIVE) 2 weeks ago

Since its premiere in Venice, where it scooped the Special Jury Prize in the Horizons section, Damian Kocur ’s feature debut “Bread and Salt” has been enjoying a stellar festival run. But the Polish helmer is already planning his next move, teasing a new project under the working title “A Night Without an End” at the Cairo Film Festival , where “Bread and Salt” plays in the International Competition section.

The story will deal with the infamous refugee crisis on the Polish-Belarusian border, reveals Kocur. He is determined to focus on the human side of the story, not politics.

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Popular on variety.

“However, he will portray them without moralizing, without judging. This way, he opens up a discussion that has no national boundaries. Suddenly, this small Polish town could just as well be an Italian, Hungarian or Greek [town].”

“I don’t care if there have been many films about [migrants] already: they are not my films. It’s like saying there have been too many films about love,” says Kocur.

“We have exhausted all the topics, so now it’s a matter of using your own voice, trying to express something sincere. If you do that, your film will always be different.”

Kocur already brought this personal approach to “Bread and Salt,” inspired by a real-life brawl outside a kebab shop, whose tragic outcome sparked race riots in his home country back in 2017. Brothers Tymoteusz and Jacek Bies are cast in the lead roles.

“I have known them since they were kids, I was friends with their older brother. I always combine fiction with real events or with the people I meet. That’s what cinema feeds on: these short moments where you can feel something authentic.”

“Violence often starts with a ‘joke,’” he says.

“Poland is contaminated with this toxicity and I don’t even know why. The period of communism was hard on us, then societal changes happened a bit too quickly. Cristi Puiu talked about the very same thing in ‘Sieranevada.’ All these post-communist societies are broken.”

“We like it when people praise us, but we should also be able to criticize things that aren’t working. It’s not like I invented violence, xenophobia and homophobia. They are there, constantly present.”

He wrote the film “quickly, intuitively” in under three weeks. Marta Konarzewska is credited as a collaborating writer.

“Someone wrote about the film that it combines Kiarostami’s observational style with Haneke’s psychological tension. Needless to say, they made my day,” laughs Kocur.

“I was trying to focus on the internal experience here, even though it has very concrete results. When I started going to therapy, I learnt a lot about cinema. At first, I was afraid to lose all my neuroses and traumas. I thought they were my driving force. It turned out to be the exact opposite.”

“Haneke said that if you achieve half of what you set out to do, that’s a lot. And I have achieved 120%! I’m not saying that to boast, but I had to let go in order to make this film. I allowed myself, and the people around me, to just be there and watch.”

Kocur, who shares a similar background to that of his characters, never set out to demonize them or their environment.

“I am not one of these Polish directors who sip their expensive coffee and talk about poverty in the province. There is violence there, sure, but my understanding of these people made this story much warmer,” he notes.

“That’s where I came from and you know what? It felt great, being there. We would eat sunflower seeds and spit out the shells all day long. It was fucking funny. Maybe that’s why I got here a bit later: I was sitting on that bench, shelling sunflower seeds. But it also shaped who I am.”

Kocur is repped by Match and Spark.

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Bread and salt, chleb i sól.

Directed by Damian Kocur

Tymek, a young pianist, student of the Warsaw University of Music, returns to his provincial town on vacation, where his mother, younger brother and friends from the neighborhood are waiting for him. The central meeting point for local youth is the newly opened kebab bar. Tymek witnesses a spiral of tensions between the employees of the Arabian kebab and his buddies.

Tymoteusz Bies Nikola Raczko Jacek Bies Dawid Piejko Małgorzata Puzio

Director Director

Damian Kocur

Producers Producers

Weronika Pacewicz Ewa Jastrzębska Jerzy Kapuściński Jacek Bromski

Writer Writer

Casting casting.

Katarzyna Iskra Piotr Steczek

Editor Editor

Cinematography cinematography.

Tomasz Woźniczka

Production Design Production Design

Ewa Mroczkowska

Stunts Stunts

Krzysztof Szymański

Sound Sound

Łukasz Kaczmarski Katarzyna Białas

Costume Design Costume Design

Zuzanna Kot

Studio Munka Stowarzyszenie Filmowców Polskich Canal+ Polska Instytucja Filmowa Silesia-Film EXA Studio

Releases by Date

08 sep 2022, 12 sep 2022, 20 may 2023.

• Theatrical limited

27 Jan 2023

21 sep 2023, 05 oct 2023, 02 nov 2023, 12 apr 2023, releases by country.

• Theatrical 12+
• Premiere La Biennale di Venezia
• Premiere Gdynia Polish Film Festival

South Korea

• Premiere All Diaspora Film Festival

99 mins   More at IMDb TMDb Report this page

Popular reviews

Review by Conal

Watching European dramas about racism makes me feel like we’re going backwards. What’s new here exactly? This exists purely to give wealthy festival goers a slap on the hand for forgetting this is an issue and a pat on the back for not being as bad as these characters.

Review by john_sko ★★★★

Two bros, chilling on a piano, one feet apart cause they’re literal brothers.

Review by Kuba Stolarz ★★★½ 1

Na granicy pretensjonalności z uwagi na rozwalające tempo czarne plansze i plagiatu Ostatniego komersu, jeśli chodzi o wizualia czy miejscami podobny klimacik, ale jak na debiut, to w opór solidny debiut. I w opór naturalny, zwyczajny, wszelkie inne synonimy słowa "prosty" portret życia na zadupiu, takiego, że wyjazd do stolicy to jakby do innego kraju – łatwo wyjechać, a ciężko wrócić przez wstrząs kulturowy. Skromność atrakcji równa się z pustką, ziomki z trzepaka okazują się ziomami tylko dla swoich, bo już tacy Arabowie, z braku lepszej okazji życiowej regularnie raczący ich kebabami, to ci4p4ci hihihi hohoho, ogółem to rozliczenie się z przeszłością, ale stojąc z boku, wcinając tego cholernego kebaba, popijawszy go piwerkiem, przyglądając się narastającemu rozłamowi tej pozornej sielanki.

A największy twist nie był pod koniec, tylko że główny bohater to w sumie też jest chujek.

Review by matilda ★★

anxiety inducing bc i was just constantly hoping the next scene wasnt just going to be another one where the main chatacter and his friends are racist to the guys at the kebab store

Review by mulina ★★★½

kurde ale to prawdziwy polishcore

Review by staxh o_o ★★★

nic nie słychać (szkoda, bo gadają świetnie) ale za to pięknie widać

Review by Tim ★★★½

someone told me this was gay…

it was not, they were just racist :(

Review by oliwia ★★★½

fajny ten whiplash, taki polski

Review by Ahmed Wael

Very conflicted about how I feel about this film.

From a technical side, it's brilliant. The long takes and the camera angles are just impeccable, and the fact that all of the actors are non-professional is testament to the skill of the filmmaker.

The story, however, is where I'm most conflicted. The characters are - for the most part - racist and violent, and the film's ending doesn't do the film or the filmmaker a great service as presenting them as not racist themselves. Not every movie about violence or racism needs to necessarily condemn them, but with Bread and Salt in specific I felt like it could've done a better job at simply not justifying or normalizing the violence…

Review by koczkos ★★★½

Ciężko mi pojąć jak to możliwe, że tak świetnie rozpoczęty film kończy się w tak żałośnie podłym amatorskim stylu. I chyba nie wynika to z niekompetencji Kocura, bo przez pierwszą połowę udowadnia, że umie film nakręcić. I to film nie byle jaki. Reżyseria przez cały czas - z wyjątkiem ostatnich minut - na najwyższym poziomie. Zdjęcia bardzo ładne i dopasowane do historii, choć na zamykanie kadru w 1.33 ciężko spojrzeć inaczej niż na sztuczkę, która z automatu podnosi jakość nawet najgorzej nagranego materiału - film tylko by zyskał na szerszym formacie, może nie odrazu 2.40, ale przedstawienie w kochanym  1.85 byłoby ostatecznym dowodem na niewątpliwą wirtuozerię operatorską. Mniejsza z tym, jak chcą kręcić w kwadracie, to niech kręcą. Szkoda tylko,…

Review by Dominik Piekarski ★★★½

Zapytacie mnie, czy mi się podobało, no oczywiście. Cudowne podejście do tworzenia kadrów, prezentowania dźwięków oraz uczynienia bohaterów możliwie najbardziej autentycznymi.

Natomiast ja zadam ważniejsze pytanie. Jak "Chleb i sól" wpłynął na rynek kebabów w Polsce?

Review by Paweł Szruba ★½ 2

Największy Try Hard bycia artsy w polskimi kinie jaki widziałem kiedykolwiek. Spoko dialogi i drugi plan aktorsko, reszta żenująca

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Bread and Salt

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All images are copyrighted by their respective copyright holders and/or producers/distributors.

• "[A] brilliant first feature (...) Kocur is a bright talent and one to keep an eye on"  Ola Salwa : Cineuropa
• "'Bread And Salt' uses individual anguish to reflect on much bigger issues in Polish society and beyond (...) Even in the heat of the moment, [it] is marked by its subtle, soulful approach to events"  Allan Hunter : Screendaily
• "There’s an icy, unforgiving clarity and compositional rigour to this arresting feature debut from Polish film-maker Damian Kocur (...) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 5)"  Peter Bradshaw : The Guardian

All copyrighted material (movie posters, DVD covers, stills, trailers) and trademarks belong to their respective producers and/or distributors.

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La biennale di venezia.

• Cinema (2022)

Chleb i sól (Bread and Salt)

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Inspired by true events, played by non- professionals. Tymek, a young, talented pianist, student of the Warsaw Academy of Music, returns to his small hometown for a vacation, a place where time has stood still. The central meeting point for local youth is the newly created kebab bar. Tymek witnesses a growing conflict between Arab kebab workers and his colleagues from the neighbourhood. A conflict that will turn out to be tragic.

Director’s Statement

The film is inspired by the events that took place a couple of years ago in a small Polish town. An immigrant working in a bar stabbed a 20-something-year-old Pole to death. After the tragedy, the local community and the whole country became convinced that the murder was based on religious grounds. There were calls to boycott Arab restaurants, or even to kill Muslims. Poland experienced, or is still experiencing, a wave of attacks on places where immigrants work. But it was this little town that became a lens focusing the current moods of people all over Europe.

Production/Distribution

PRODUCTION 1: Jacek Bromski, Ewa Jastrzebska, Jerzy Kapuscinski– Munk Studio - Polish Filmmakers Association Panska 85 00-834 – Warsaw, Poland Tel. +48 225565470 [email protected]

PRODUCTION 2: Canal+ Poland Al. Gen. W. Sikorskiego 9 02-758 – Warsaw, Poland Tel. +48 515285732 [email protected]

OTHER COPRODUCTIONS: Silesia Film Fund; KIVI Rental; King House Michal Sadowski; EXA Studio

WORLD SALES: Izabela Kiszka-Hoflik – IKH Pictures Promotion Zloty Potok 8/39 02-699 – Warsaw, Poland Tel. +48 514254490 [email protected]

PRESS OFFICE: Izabela Kiszka-Hoflik – IKH Pictures Promotion Zloty Potok 8/39 02-699 – Warsaw, Poland Tel. +48 514254490 [email protected]

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Bread and Salt (2023)

Original title: chleb i sól.

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Tymek, a young pianist, student of the Warsaw University of Music, returns to his provincial town on vacation, where his mother, younger brother and friends from the neighborhood are waiting for him. The central meeting point for local youth is the newly opened kebab bar. Tymek witnesses a spiral of tensions between the employees of the Arabian kebab and his buddies.

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Bread and Salt Reviews

No All Critics reviews for Bread and Salt.

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BFI Flare 2023: ‘Bread and Salt’ Review

Stars: Tymoteusz Bies, Jacek Bies | Written by Damian Kocur, Marta Konarzewska | Directed by Damian Kocur

While studying at the Warsaw Academy of Music, Tymoteusz (Tymoteusz Bies) returns to his hometown for a visit. Surrounded by his friends and younger brother Jacek (Jacek Bies), his group makes a beeline for the new kebab shop opened up by two Arabic immigrants. As tensions rise throughout the summer, Tymoteusz assesses where he stands in the gap between a familiar past and an ever-changing present.

It’s possibly fair to say that those rocking up to a mid-month film festival without much idea of what’s on the schedule might not be too au fait with Polish cinema. Classics such as Ida and Interrogation are heralded as worthy watches, yet the visual imagery of Polish culture instead often comes from BBC News clips of homophobic policies and immigrants who are despised by the Brits. In a roundabout way, Damian Kocur’s Bread and Salt feeds into this outside thinking. Centring around a group of teenagers at odds with the local outsiders, Polish youth are displayed in exactly the heinous, stereotypical way that we imagine they might be. Taunting and beating the kebab shop workers to a pulp, the group (as a whole) toe a line between out-and-out violence and calculated, manipulative tension-building. While this may or may not be an accurate depiction of modern-day Polish youth, the most interesting point of note is Tymoteusz himself.

Though the overall outward perception may not leave much to be desired, Tymoteusz represents a more nuanced, individual conflict. Simultaneously trying to befriend the two outsiders while standing by and watching the others decimate them, he represents the type of person who is quick to perform. Claiming to be the bold ally and hero needed in a moment of desperation, they often can’t see themselves how they actually are — silent and complicit. Considering the cast is made up of non-professional actors, it’s a stunning feat to get a film that’s as stunningly direct and considered as Bread and Salt . Through a visual lens that looks pre-packaged for a MUBI deal, the naturalistic styling of the narrative and ensemble feels as though viewers are a fly on the wall for a less-than-typical summer at home. Often using their real names, the dedication to both music and teenage rites of passage is quietly joyous yet loaded with ulterior motives. A leopard can’t change its tune, and Tymoteusz certainly proves the myth to be a reality.

Whether it’s a harsh light on a contrived perception or a shrewd exploration of what’s really lying under the surface, Bread and Salt is nonetheless a compelling piece of Polish cinema. Taking metaphorical cues from its chosen namesake, its deep-dive into open-arms Europe is a visceral bite out of what is often swept under the carpet.

Bread and Salt screened on March 24th – 26th as part of this year’s BFI Flare Film Festival.

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Tymoteusz, a young pianist, returns to his hometown for a vacation, a provincial town, like many in Poland. The central meeting point for local youth is the newly created kebab bar. But, over time, the conflict between a group of employees and the boys from the estate worsens.

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Bread and Salt

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Tymoteusz, a pianist - student of the Warsaw Academy of Music, returns to his hometown for a vacation. A provincial town, like many in Poland, is a place where time has stood still, especially now during hot holidays. Tymek's friends and his brother Jacek stayed in the city, also a pianist, who, however, did not enter the Academy of Music and spends time with his friends in the estate. A stay in his hometown is only a holiday stop to Western Europe, where Tymoteusz received a foreign scholarship. The central meeting point for local youth is the newly created kebab bar. Local youth live well with foreigners, but there are some minor exceptions. Over time, the conflict between a group of employees and the boys from the estate worsens. Fear and a sense of threat begin to develop in intimidated foreigners.

• Bread and Salt [PL] (2022): film profile , film review , trailer , interview: Damian Kocur

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