Breakfast with Na Zdrowie!

An interview with Paulina Ziółkowska, director of Na Zdrowie!

 Why were you interested in germs and their spread?
I get the flu quite often. And when you are lying in bed, sick and bored, you have a lot of time to think about stuff. And I made a film.

 How much have you been inspired by symbiosis, duplication, cell division?
Not so much. I was thinking more about this saying: “I am sick of you”. Like literally, to be sick of someone, of other people. I was always interested how much we influence each other. How differently people behave according to who is around them. How fashion is affecting us. The same person can act completely different, be rude or kind, happy or stressed, talking with different people. As there was no set character, everything was fluent and constantly changing. We are always surrounded by others, and constantly influenced by them, constantly being made as much by others as by ourselves.

 Had you planned right from the beginning to complete a switchover to mental or intellectual union, duplication, separation?
Yes, I liked the fact that sickness can affect your body but also your soul, your selfness. The germs that infiltrate you make a mysterious job, and you don’t know how deep they can affect you.

 How often do you play with colours in your animation films? What was your interest in colours for that film in particular?
I really love colors. I love them so much that I tried to use all of them. In this film I could, because the colors also had meaning. Every person had their own color and the colors could mix, divide or superimpose over each other, just as the people were mixing and influencing each other.

 Would you say that the short film format has given you any particular freedom?
Yes, it certainly has. It gives so much more possibilities to talk through symbols and show more abstract ideas than to just tell stories. I wonder if there is another way you could show in film people sneezing themselves into other people.

Na Zdrowie! was shown in International Competition.