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RETURN TO Jadwiga Plucińska We Went on Holiday

Plucińska’s documentary report from different holiday destinations celebrates the first ever mass departure of three hundred thousands people from the cities to enjoy fresh air and their time off work. As we learn from the narrator, it was possible thanks to the sponsorship from the central Fund for Workers’ Holidays/Fundusz Wczasów Pracowniczych.

We Went on Holiday

  • Byliśmy na wczasach
  • 1946
  • dir. Jadwiga Plucińska
  • 17 min 29 sec

Plucińska’s documentary report from different holiday destinations celebrates the first ever mass departure of three hundred thousands people from the cities to enjoy fresh air and their time off work. As we learn from the narrator, it was possible thanks to the sponsorship from the central Fund for Workers’ Holidays/Fundusz Wczasów Pracowniczych.

Advertising the modern comforts offered by the new regime, the film matches the standards of the immediate post-war propaganda. It offers plenty of unique imagery of everyday vacation activities, in which both men and women can engage; even if it is evident that to capture all the necessary details with a heavy, immobile camera, Plucińska had to stage the majority of her scenes.

Following shots of a railway station, where people wave the departing train, the camera shows a small crowd in swimsuits dancing in the water. After a dissolve, images of the train, a distant industrial landscape and workers in offices and on factory floors serve as backgrounds for titles introducing the Fund and its operations.

A happy song with lyrics about holidays as an award for the effort at their jobs greets some other workers on trains, as they arrive in the mountains. The camera shows hotels and holiday houses, all newly renovated to accommodate the anticipated crowds. ‘It took lots of social changes for the working man to make his dreams about holidays come true’, says the narrator.

From then on, accompanied by the enthusiastic voice of the commentator, who here and there praises the social successes of the new regime, we observe people enjoying their time away from the city. The camera accompanies a group hiking in the mountains, where it becomes apparent that some of the tourists are new to the environment. For example, women climb rocky trails wearing high heels and fashionable summer dresses.

A title on the screen signals a change of location. We move to Spała to join a group of young men and women running through the woods, swimming, sitting by a bonfire and posing for photos. The narrator’s witty remarks add to the cheerful atmosphere of the setting. The sequence concludes with some satisfied women back at work, as they show holiday pictures to their co-workers.

A similar carefree aura underlies the next two parts of the film from Wisła and an unnamed location at the seaside. Here we also observe workers playing ball, enjoying water sports and going on a short sea cruise.

Although the pleasant, always sunny holidays come to an end, the film closes with the same images the viewer saw in the opening sequence. The narrator reassures us that these weren’t just one-off events in these workers lives: ‘Holidays have become a regular part of the working class experience’.

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