Mia Wasikowska stars in Kuba Dorabialski’s “Agata the Writer,” a film exploring the intersection of cinema and literature. The film, set in Sarajevo, follows a Polish-Australian writer as she attempts to interview war survivors.
Wasikowska, known for roles in films like “Alice in Wonderland,” has been focusing on arthouse projects. She also executive produced “Agata the Writer,” praising its unconventional narrative structure and the creative freedom it allowed. “I was really excited about making a film that didn’t follow a typical narrative structure. I feel like we have tunnel vision about how to tell a story and make a film,” Wasikowska notes. She is proud the film was made in a market that is “increasingly myopic about how it’s done.”
The film centers on Agata, a writer who travels to Sarajevo to document the experiences of war survivors, but finds her motives questioned. Strange disappearances of artwork add another layer to the story. Dorabialski, coming from a background in video art, aimed to combine cinematic and literary techniques. “How do you make these two very different but also very interconnected forms of expression work? Reading is a solitary practice, and we experience cinema collectively,” he states.
Dorabialski explains his interest in exploring Slavic identity outside of Eastern Europe, specifically focusing on the connection between Bosnia and Poland. “I was interested in the idea of Slavic identity outside Eastern Europe and what it means to be part of this linguistic ethnic group,” he said. He also discussed the unique constraints and possibilities of cinema, noting, “Cinema felt really exciting to me precisely because it has rules. There’s a definite beginning and end time; there’s a dark room and a screen. We’re just brains in a void.” In one arresting scene, Wasikowska’s character directly addresses the audience, recounting the rest of the story. “I was so curious about it,” Wasikowska says of the scene. “Luckily, when I’m doing something, I don’t think too much about how it’s going to be perceived…But then, when I was watching the scene, I thought: ‘Ok. That’s enough of my face!’”,
The film is a production of Whitefalk Films and Produktion Productions, and is being sold by MMM Film Sales. Dorabialski initially struggled with the film’s title but ultimately “felt affection for it” by the time of its Venice premiere.
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