'60s Polish Road Movie

We hand out our first straight A to a 2014 release: 

IDA (A) - This modest, flawless, gorgeous film tells the simple story of a Polish orphan, on the eve of joining a nunnery, discovering that she's Jewish and exploring her family roots.

Set in 1962, "Ida" follows Anna (Agata Trzebuchowska) -- born Ida Lubenstein -- who grew up after World War II in an orphanage run by nuns. Poised to take her vows, she is encouraged to seek out the relative who wouldn't take her in -- her Aunt Wanda (Agata Kulesza). Anna shows up at her aunt's door dressed in her habit, and not long after Wanda shoos off her latest one-night stand, she bluntly spills the beans about Anna's heritage. ("So, you're going to be a Jewish nun?")

Wanda is unapologetic about her lifestyle. She drinks too much, chain smokes and sleeps around indiscriminately. It's her way of sublimating her guilt and self-hatred over being a judicial apparatchik complicit in the postwar Communist nation. She urges Anna to loosen up a bit and encourages her niece to misbehave a bit so that her sacrifice will mean something. They decide to pay a visit to her childhood home, which was taken from her parents, who were killed during the war.

They hit the road. Pawel Pawlikowski ("My Summer of Love" and the recent guilty pleasure "The Woman in the Fifth") shoots in exquisite black and white, in a spare, square 1:1 ratio. The cinematography is so authentic that it looks like the movie was made in 1962 (or 1952); I felt swept up, lost in a classic film noir. It's like an epic lost road movie come magically to life.

As gorgeous as Pawlikowski's movie is, it would be nothing without the rich storytelling and compelling performances from Trzebuchowska, with the face of an angel (she has the big eyes and round face of Claire Danes), and the hard-bitten Kulesza. Anna seems curious about her aunt's vices. They pick up a hitch-hiker, a handsome saxophonist who plays in a pop band but who dreams of being the next Coltrane (featured on the soundtrack). He and Anna engage in a chaste flirtation.

Will Anna/Ida give in to temptation? Her aunt continues to goad her. "This Jesus of yours," Wanda snarls, "adored people like me."

Eventually she and Wanda find the family living in the Lubensteins' former home. Both women seek closure.

Pawlikowski stretches his characters in interesting ways. A shock towards the end shakes Anna's faith.

Long before that, though, you're already haunted by this poignant film.

BONUS TRACK
The trailer: