Poland’s Damian Kocur Follows ‘Bread and Salt’ With Ukraine-Centered ‘Under the Volcano,’ Debuts Trailer: ‘It Was Important to Mark My Solidarity’ (EXCLUSIVE)

Say hello to the Ukrainian family of four (Roman Lutskyi, Anastasiia Karpienko, Sofiia Berezovska, Fedir Pugachov), enjoying their Canary Islands holiday. That is, until the invasion begins and they are stuck in their nice hotel, surrounded by others who are still in the party mode.

Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh Bring Steamy Sex, Sobs and Wild Birthing Scene to TIFF With 'We Live in Time'

“The starting point was a newspaper article, just like with my debut ‘Bread and Salt.’ It was about Ukrainians who were surprised by the war in Madagascar,” explained director Damian Kocur, who is premiering “Under the Volcano” at Toronto.

“It was also about my own emotions and this sense of helplessness I felt in the first weeks of the war. That’s when I wrote the script. I felt I had to react to it somehow, and it was the only way I knew how.”

For Kocur’s characters, the world has changed overnight. But not for other hotel guests, who just want to have fun and enjoy the all-you-can-eat buffet.

“[Leader of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising] Marek Edelman also wrote about life in the ghetto, where restaurants operated despite the fact that children were starving to death on the sidewalks. My film was inspired by the stories of people who found out about the war on vacation. This continuing carousel of parties and loud music was a huge blow to them. It made them feel alienated.”

Still, cinema will never be able to truly “react” to current events, he said.

“The financing system alone prevents it from being an interventionist medium, and that’s fine. Good films tell stories about a particular moment in history and time, and they can be ‘read’ in isolation from that specific event. After all, war is always happening somewhere in the world, but we suddenly woke up because it’s the white part of Europe and not some country in Africa,” he stressed.

“I don’t show war, but I am sure the film would be shown at more festivals if it was made a year or even more years ago. I don’t resent programmers for that – they react to it the same way audiences do. We just get exhausted.”

“Under the Volcano,” which premieres the trailer with Variety , is produced by Mikołaj Lizut of Lizart Film and Agnieszka Jastrzębska of Hawk Art. Grzegorz Słoniewski of MGM SA, Michał Maksym of TVP SA and the Polish Film Institute co-produce, while Salaud Morisset handles sales.

When picking up awards for “Bread and Salt” in Venice back in 2022, Kocur wore a Ukrainian ribbon to show his support.

“It was important to mark my solidarity somehow,” he said.

“At first, I was afraid of the reactions of the Ukrainians – a director from Poland was going to make a film about their war. But this film combines their experiences with the perspective of western Europe. In the end, my Ukrainian friends said they were grateful. It made me feel it was the right thing to do.”

'Hard Truths' Review: You Can't Help but Love a Bitter Marianne Jean-Baptiste in Mike Leigh's Slender Sketch

He would never film at the frontlines, however.

“I don’t think it would be ethical. I wasn’t there during these first days of the Russian onslaught. Making art off human suffering is, in my opinion, morally troublesome.”

“If something is authentic, regardless of its subject, it will find a listener and a viewer. The same things happen to us all the time, but not all of us have the time and the ability to describe them in cinema or literature.”

Kocur believes each story “requires different language.”

“In my two films, there are quite a lot of similarities in my way of working, but the way of telling the story is different. The camera is less rigorous, the film is less formal, less clinical.”

He’s still interested in families, though.

“Maybe because I don’t have my own just yet?”

Already working on his next project “La Manche,” he will deal with much-publicized events on the Polish-Belarusian border next. Following the changes in Poland’s previously right-wing government and appointment of new Prime Minister, he’s hoping it will finally happen.

“The Minister of Culture blocked the implementation of my project. I hope that under the government of Donald Tusk, censorship won’t appear in art anymore,” he said.

“This film will deal with the refugee crisis again, because I just can’t get away from that. What’s happening in the world right now is the biggest migration of people in history. It’s impossible not to talk about it.”

At Variety's TIFF Cover Party, Demi Moore Says 'The Substance' Has 'Powerful Themes About Aging and Beauty'