Polish films have been scoring slots in the box office top 10 in the UK and Ireland as well as other countries over the past few years making the leap from art house to commercial success abroad. Titles like Pitbull and Botox, both directed by Patryk Vega, were UK box office hits while The Clergy directed by Wojciech Smarzowski scored a record of approximately 1.1 m EUR / 1 m GBP during its first opening weekend in Ireland and the UK.

A driving force behind this success is distributor Phoenix Productions. FNE spoke to Phoenix CEO Joanna Michalec

WARSAW: The Polish Film Institute supported eight feature films with 2 m EUR / 8.9 m PLN during the third and the last session of financing in 2018.

WARSAW: The sequel to box office hit Planet Single had over 1 m admissions and remains in the number one spot in Poland for the third week in a row. The romantic comedy continues a streak of locally produced titles topping Polish box office charts in 2018.

KATOWICE: World-renowned Polish film director Lech Majewski is working on his new drama Brigitte Bardot the Wonderful, based on his novel of the same title. The release is planned for 2020.

WARSAW: World famous Polish cinematographer Witold Sobociński died unexpectedly on 19 November 2018 at age 89. The news came days after the cinematographer visited the Camerimage International Film Festival, where he was presented the Lifetime Achievement Award for his work by Roman Polanski.

WARSAW: The third session of PISF funding resulted in supporting six projects with minority international coproduction financing, with a total of 3,943,345 PLN / 915 101 EUR.

WARSAW: The Polish/British WWII drama about Polish fighter pilots, 303 Squadron directed by Denis Delić, opened in 16th place, and was the second strongest foreign film in the UK and Ireland, taking in 120,000 GBP during the opening weekend.

WARSAW: Małgorzata Szumowska is developing a Polish/German coproduction entitled The Masseur.

SZCZECIN: Patryk Vega is working on a sequel to his box-office hit Women of Mafia with an international cast and release planned for February 2019.

WARSAW: Polish films have racked up a record 15 m admissions in 2018, breaking all previous annual records, with two months still to go.