The artistic director of Millennium Docs Against Gravity in Poland gives a response to Wim Wenders after the German director said that filmmakers should “stay away from politics.”
“I won’t disagree with the person who said it, but with feelings,” said Karol Piekarczyk on the opening night of the international documentary festival in Warsaw, referring to the comments Wenders made as president of the Berlinale jury in February. “I don’t know since when human rights became politics.
Piekarczyk added, “I think there’s a deep misunderstanding of how filmmakers work, especially filmmakers. It’s not like you have a list of topics and you just choose, maybe I’ll do this or maybe I’ll do that. It doesn’t work like that. Alisa [Kovalenko, director of Traces] he didn’t make his film because he had this list and he just thought he was going to make a film. He did it because it is a personal matter, but it is a matter that people need to hear. It’s a matter of sexual violence being considered a weapon.”
In an interview with Deadline, the artistic director expanded on his words.
Opening night of Millennium Docs Against Gravity in Warsaw.
Matthew Carey
“That movies aren’t supposed to be political, I don’t know,” he paused, before adding, “If you think that not talking about genocide, not talking about racism, not talking about injustice is going to make them go away, well, this is so stupid. We have to talk about these things. Basic human rights were created to be apolitical – not to be on your political side. Left, center, whatever, these are basic human rights but we live in a country where they have been included in politics despite this big honest opinion that they should not be in politics.
Piekarczyk noted that documentary filmmakers have faced criticism for taking on a political issue.
“It happened at different festivals where filmmakers were showing films with difficult topics, talking about genocide and Palestine. Meanwhile, other festivals are distancing themselves from these producers who are showing their work,” he said. “To me, this is complete madness.
On the contrary, he said about MDAG, “When we choose films, we will always follow the filmmakers because this is part of our identity and this is what the viewers expect from us, especially in this troubled world where you need to participate and you need to feel this community, which also helps you not to feel helpless, not to feel alone and to feel that we can start creating new things from scratch.”
Wim Wenders at the 2026 Berlin Film Festival.
Arturo Holmes/Getty Images
The Wenders canon, incl Wings of Desire, Perfect Dates, Buena Vista Social Clubagain Pope Francis: A Man of His Wordincludes fiction and non-fiction. He made his comments about filmmakers not getting involved in politics at the press conference of the judges at the opening of the Berlin Film Festival, which in the following days, was a question asked of all the prominent people present.
At the awards ceremony that closed the Berlinale, some of the winners used their speeches to welcome the Palestinian people and criticize Israel for its war in Gaza. Those words, viewed with disdain by some German politicians, made the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM), which manages the money and supervises the Berlinale, to call an unexpected meeting to discuss the future of the leadership of the Berlinale and Tricia Tuttle as the director of the festival. Looks like he’s still strong in that storm.
Opportunities for governments to intervene in film festivals arise regularly in Europe, where taxpayers’ money is used to fund those events to a greater or lesser degree depending on the country. For MDAG, the main sponsor is the Millennium Bank, not a government entity, which largely takes government intervention out of the equation.
“I have to say we were very lucky,” Piekarczyk said. “If I had to organize a festival in a place like the Berlinale and have all this pressure… I don’t know if I can do it. [at MDAG]. We have major sponsors of this festival who have been with us for years and they are with us despite the fact that we also show films that criticize capitalism saying that it should not be reconsidered, rebuilt, or think of another world. They never said anything about our plan, and they were very agreeable [with us]. They are also fans of the festival, which is amazing.”
The Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw, one of the main locations of the Millennium Docs Against Gravity.
Matthew Carey
Piekarczyk added, “We had a period, a really long time, when we had a right-wing government in Poland, but the only kind of direct pressure we got was funding, or rather the lack of funding. But there was a point when institutions like the Polish Film Institute – because we grew so big and globally we grew so big – they didn’t ignore us… idiots while they were going around the world and people were saying, ‘Oh, [you] have a wonderful celebration’ and things like that.”
MDAG is held simultaneously in seven Polish cities: Wroclaw, Gdynia, Katowice, Poznań, Bydgoszcz, Łódź, and Warsaw. The audience is showing interest in it in increasing numbers.
“Many people are coming, 180,000 [admissions] last year,” Piekarczyk noted. So, we’re in that, very, very lucky.”
MDAG continues in person until May 18, with the online portion running from May 19 to June 1. Awards for the MDAG Industry portion of the festival will be presented at a ceremony on Sunday night.
