Nóz w wodzie [Knife in the Water] (1962)

(On Cable TV, May 2022) I’m watching early Roman Polanski films just so that I can clear up his filmography and be done with the (pedophile rapist fugitive) guy. His Polish debut feature, Knife in the Water, is not meant to be all that complex: A married couple picks up a hitchhiker on their way to a weekend sailing trip and tensions rise between the three characters in the hermetic setting as the husband begins a low-intensity bullying campaign toward the other man, the wife starts seducing him — and the hitchhiker, well, who cares, right? There’s an unrealistic tone built in the film from its very beginning, and that would explain why Knife in the Water is going to appeal a lot more to the arthouse crowd than anyone else – the pacing alone makes this almost unbearable to anyone looking for a conventional thriller, and the film isn’t all that interested in being a straight-up plotting exercise anyway. I can see the appeal: it’s crafted meticulously, it’s clearly adept in symbolism (even when it’s on the nose, such as the crossroads ending) and Polanski here may be slow, but he’s not wasteful. In the end, well, I’ve seen Knife in the Water and that’s that – no need to ever revisit it.