On Hitler’s Highway (2002)

Directed by: Lech Kowalski | 81 minutes | documentary | With: Lech Kowalski

The first person Kowalski speaks to is an invalid in a wheelchair who sells mushrooms by the roadside. Almost drowned out by the speeding traffic, the man gives an extensive explanation of why you should not cook mushrooms, that you can dry them and whether large mushrooms are better than small ones. Why the man immediately starts off so passionately, almost aggressively, is unclear, but at the same time revealing. His trade is his pride and his life, there is nothing else.

Kowalski also meets several Bulgarian hookers along the way who try to pick up customers along the way. The women are worried about their disappointing income and their pimps. The Bulgarian whores had it so bad in their own country that they are happy to be able to earn money in Poland. This is in contrast to a Russian whore who only cries when she is not at work. But really pathetic is the man who openly says that he can’t pay the whores and therefore has to be satisfied with spying on them when they are busy with their customers.

Furthermore, Kowalski meets a young couple and their girlfriend who live in Auschwitz (‘you have to live somewhere’). Their longing for a nightclub in the city does not sound like a strange wish, but when you see the gas chambers and incinerators a little later, you feel you’re uncomfortable with the idea.

Symbolic of the poverty among the Polish population is the mother of a large family that literally has to beg to feed her husband and children. And the conversation between two gypsies about the watch of one of the two will not soon take place in a country like the Netherlands. One wants to know from the other whether his watch is running properly. The other replies that this is indeed the case and that he was also asked to sell it, but he didn’t want to. A well-functioning watch is apparently a luxury product.

‘On Hitler’s Highway’ is from 2002 and filmed in Europe. That is almost unimaginable, the people are so poor and their existence has been so hopeless since the fall of communism. Kowalski uses his camera in an effective way to extract people’s deepest secrets and thoughts. She does not want the neighbors to know that the mother of the large family goes begging, but she does tell Kowalski. That a group of Bulgarian whores sit in front of his camera like giggling girls shows how much they feel at ease with him. Everyone he speaks to is poor or has their setbacks, but Kowalski gives them the space to tell their story and he is also genuinely interested.

As a viewer, you ride with Kowalski in the car and traverse this area battered by history. You can hear from the local population how they are doing and experience how they experience the consequences of modern history. Very special.