On Thursday, May 25, VOC hosted the international pre-screening of The Pilecki Report, a must-see film telling the story of Polish hero and resistance fighter Witold Pilecki. VOC President Ambassador Andrew Bremberg kicked off the evening, followed by remarks from VOC Trustee Ambassador Aldona Woś, and Polish National Foundation President and Chairman of the Board, Dr. Marcin Zarzecki. Before the film screening, Prof. Piotr Gliński, the Polish Minister of Culture and National Heritage delivered a speech via video message.
The Pilecki Report was produced by Documentary and Feature Film Studios in cooperation with Telewizja Polska S.A. and the Polish National Foundation, and co-financed by the Polish Film Institute.
The film depicts the incredible story of Witold Pilecki. A distinguished army officer, Pilecki joined the Polish resistance in the early days of the Second World War, volunteering to infiltrate and report on the Nazi atrocities inside the Auschwitz concentration camp. Allowing himself to be captured and sent to the camp, he organized a resistance network among the prisoners and smuggled intelligence out. Pilecki’s intelligence was circulated among Allied governments, providing one of the first eyewitness accounts of the Holocaust.
The film, directed by Leszek Wosiewicz and Krzysztof Łukaszewicz, focuses on Pilecki’s heroic actions against Nazi occupation but also shows his escape, participation in the Warsaw Uprising, and continued resistance after Poland’s occupation by the Soviet Red Army. In 1948, Pilecki was captured, tortured, sentenced to death by the communist government, and written out of history. Today, he is remembered as a Polish hero—a symbol of courage, freedom, and solidarity with the persecuted.
