Igor Aksman

Nowhere near his really fine film "Ida", Cold War is full of cliche and stereotypes. Life in socialist Poland was not all that horrible, while jazz in Paris was not all that good. Polish people were not all corrupt socialist dupes. This film looks like it came out with Hollywood as Pawlikowsky's next target. Pure and simple - it was made according to all bad Western stereotypes about life behind iron curtain. The characters are not believable, not real people, without much chemistry between them, other than heavy smooching. Pretentious staging and cinematography, gives bad name to "arthouse films". Two stars rating at best.