Billboard

The story takes place in Warszawa, where Kuba, a 20-yearold advertisement photographer, plays the leading part. He gets involved in violent incidents when trying to persuade a Russian woman called Masza to contribute to a commercial. Instead of Masza he meets another Russian woman called Tania. When she is at Kubas' apartment the police burst in and arrest them both. Since young Russian women have been murdered in the city and he has made inquiries about Masza, the police suspect Kuba. But not only the police show an interest in Kuba and Tania, as we will find out. Billboard is a story of present day Poland, containing a thriller intrigue and a bittersweet love story. When Kuba speaks in a mobile-phone with the Palace of Culture and Science in the background - reminiscent of the Soviet era - we can see it as a symbol of the development of the Eastern Bloc to the market economy that it has now. The rich and successful work within advertising and it is here where Russian women seek their fortune too, hoping to find a better future than the one the Russian factories can offer. In Billboard the women meet problems that at first seem to be the fault of society but it later becomes clear that there are other reasons. Pictures reflecting the world of advertisements appear in Billboard as cuts of commercials but they influence the style of the whole film. Zadrynski uses fast cuts and portable handy-cam images. The colour scale changes in a visually effective way following the action and mood changes in sequences that remind us of the fast cuts of music videos. The style in which it is filmed resembles at times TV-series such as NYPD Blue and The X-Files.