There are films that you watch, and then there are films that you inhabit. Paweł Pawlikowski’s 2013 masterpiece, ‘Ida,’ is unequivocally the latter. Shot in a stark, breathtakingly beautiful black and white and framed in the nearly square 4:3 Academy ratio, the film is a vessel of memory, a quiet meditation on faith, identity, and the ghosts of a history that refuse to be buried. It tells the story of Anna, a young novitiate nun in 1960s Poland who, on the cusp of taking her vows, discovers she is Jewish and that her real name is Ida Lebenstein. Urged by her Mother Superior to connect with her only living relative, she meets her aunt, Wanda Gruz, a cynical, hard-drinking state prosecutor. Together, they embark on a somber road trip into the Polish countryside to uncover the tragic fate of their family during the Nazi occupation. But this journey is more than a plot device; it’s a deep dive into the soul of a nation grappling with its past. The locations in ‘Ida’ are not mere backdrops; they are silent, potent characters. The crumbling tenement buildings of Łódź, the austere convent walls, and the desolate, winter-bitten landscapes are saturated with the unspoken grief and complex truths of post-war Poland. To walk these streets, to stand in these spaces, is to step directly into the film’s poetic frame, to feel the profound weight and melancholic beauty that Pawlikowski so masterfully captured. This is not a pilgrimage to a set, but a journey into an atmosphere, a tangible piece of cinematic history that breathes with the quiet resonance of the past.
For those who feel called to walk in the footsteps of cinematic history, a similar pilgrimage awaits in Sicily, where the magic of Cinema Paradiso was born.
The Soul of the City: Łódź’s Enduring Presence
The city of Łódź serves as the primary backdrop for ‘Ida,’ a place that openly displays its complicated history. Once a flourishing industrial hub nicknamed the ‘Polish Manchester,’ its fortunes have fluctuated over time, leaving behind a blend of grand architecture and dignified decay. For Pawlikowski, Łódź was more than just a convenient setting; it was a vital choice. Its pre-war buildings and the lingering presence of the socialist era created the ideal visual language for the film’s somber mood. The city’s streets seem haunted by their past—the vibrant multiculturalism of the early 20th century, the unspeakable horrors of the Łódź Ghetto, and the harsh austerity of the subsequent communist regime. Walking through Łódź today, one can feel the film’s essence in the chill of the air, the way light touches peeling facades, and the profound silence of its many courtyards.
The Tenement of Ghosts: Wanda’s Apartment
Wanda’s apartment building is among the film’s most powerful settings. It is here that Anna, sheltered and naive, first confronts the secular world in all its smoky, complex reality. The actual filming location is a courtyard at Kilińskiego 103, a quintessential Łódź tenement building. Standing in this space is an almost uncanny experience. Looking up, you see the same geometric patterns of balconies and windows framing the sky as in the film. The air feels thick with the imagined scent of Wanda’s cigarettes and the faint sound of jazz drifting from an open window. These ‘kamienice,’ or stone houses, are central to Łódź’s identity. Built in the 19th and early 20th centuries, they housed the city’s growing population. Their ornate facades often conceal networks of inner courtyards, creating secluded worlds within city blocks. During World War II, many of these buildings were enclosed within the Łódź Ghetto, the second-largest in German-occupied Europe. They became places marked by immense suffering and loss. Visiting Kilińskiego 103 means standing on ground steeped in deep historical trauma. The peeling paint and crumbling plaster are not just aesthetic choices by the filmmakers; they are the real, unvarnished textures of a city that has endured. For the respectful visitor, the experience is profound. Since these are residential buildings, a quiet and observant presence is essential. Notice the small details: the wrought-iron railings, the worn cobblestones, the way sound echoes differently within the enclosed space. This place invites reflection on the countless lives—like that of the fictional Lebenstein family—lived and lost within these walls.
A Path of Austerity: The Streets of Łódź
Beyond the courtyard, the general streetscapes of Łódź act as a constant, brooding character. Pawlikowski and his cinematographers, Łukasz Żal and Ryszard Lenczewski, deliberately selected streets that conveyed emptiness and stagnation, reflecting the characters’ emotional states and the era’s oppressive atmosphere. They avoided the more renovated areas of the city, opting instead for the unadorned, often neglected corners that preserved the spirit of the 1960s. The film is filled with static, carefully framed shots of wide, empty boulevards, tram lines stretching toward a grey horizon, and desolate side streets where the only movement is a passing car or lone pedestrian. Many scenes were filmed in the districts of Śródmieście and Bałuty, which still boast substantial pre-war architecture. Walking these streets is like seeing the world through Pawlikowski’s lens. You notice the stark geometry of buildings, the rhythmic repetition of windows, the texture of brick and stone. Piotrkowska Street, the city’s famous main artery, is vibrant and lively, but the Łódź of ‘Ida’ exists in the quiet, parallel streets just a block or two away. It is within these less-traveled areas that the film’s soul resides. A late afternoon walk, as shadows lengthen and streetlights cast a lonely glow, can feel like stepping back in time. The city’s extensive tram network, featured in the film, also offers a fantastic way to experience its landscape, providing a moving panorama of the architectural layers defining Łódź.
A Fleeting Escape: The Hotel and Jazz Club
In stark contrast to the bleakness of their search, Wanda introduces Anna to a world of fleeting sensory pleasure: the smoky ambiance of a hotel bar and the seductive melancholy of a jazz club. These scenes offer a momentary escape, a window into the modernity and suppressed desires of 1960s Poland. While the specific interiors may have been filmed on sets or in locations since altered, the spirit of these places lives on in establishments like the historic Hotel Grand. Its elegant yet slightly faded grandeur perfectly evokes the era. This was a time of cultural thaw in Poland, when jazz—once heavily suppressed during Stalinist years—reemerged as a powerful symbol of freedom and artistic expression. John Coltrane’s music, prominent in the film, was the soundtrack to this quiet rebellion. Visiting a jazz club in Poland today, one can still tap into that energy. The film captures the atmosphere with palpable precision: the clinking of glasses, low murmurs of conversation, the hypnotic pull of the saxophone, and the haze of cigarette smoke creating a soft-focus veil over the room. In this world, Anna witnesses a different kind of life—one of passion, world-weariness, and art. It is a crucial part of her journey, and seeking out these atmospheric pockets of nightlife in Łódź or Warsaw allows visitors to experience the sensual textures that briefly punctuate ‘Ida’s’ austere world.
The Quiet Convent and the Unsettling Countryside
If Łódź embodies the heavy weight of history and the complexities of the secular world, the film’s other key settings—the convent and the rural landscape—provide a striking counterbalance. These are spaces marked by silence, but of two distinctly different kinds: one borne of sacred devotion, the other of buried, unspeakable truth. The journey between them forms the central arc of the film, moving from sheltered faith to harrowing knowledge.
A World Apart: The Convent of Solitude
The film begins in the serene, ordered realm of the convent, the only life Anna has ever known. The scenes are imbued with profound stillness—a world of simple rituals, quiet prayer, and cold stone. Soft light streams through high arched windows, illuminating dust motes dancing in the air. The convent was filmed in a former presbytery in the village of Klemensów, its architecture stark and minimalist, mirroring the ascetic lives of its inhabitants. The visual composition here is masterful, emphasizing clean lines, geometric shapes, and the contrast between the nuns’ dark habits and the pale, whitewashed walls. This creates a sense of enclosure, a sanctuary sealed off from the chaos of the outside world. The atmosphere feels timeless, as if this life has persisted unchanged for centuries. For those seeking the spirit of this place, visiting a historic monastery or convent in rural Poland can be deeply moving. The key is to embrace the silence: listen to the echo of footsteps on stone floors, observe the movement of light throughout the day, and feel the palpable peace and contemplation that fill the air. It is from this world of absolute certainty and quiet devotion that Anna is cast out, making her ensuing journey into Poland’s dark reality all the more jarring and transformative.
The Road to Revelation: The Rural Landscape
The road trip itself serves as a central visual motif. As Wanda and Anna leave the city, the screen fills with images of the Polish countryside in winter. The landscape is flat, vast, and unforgiving. Skeletal trees reach toward a perpetually overcast sky. Fields are blanketed in a thin layer of snow or mud, a monochrome palette that echoes the film’s cinematography. This is no romanticized countryside; it is a land stripped bare, emptied of life, holding secrets beneath its frozen surface. The car, a small vessel navigating this great emptiness, highlights the characters’ isolation and the daunting nature of their mission. Their journey takes them through neglected villages and along deserted country roads—places untouched by time. This landscape becomes a character itself, a silent witness to the horrors that unfolded there. It reflects the characters’ internal desolation—Wanda’s cynicism and Anna’s growing awareness of a brutal world previously unknown to her. To truly engage with this facet of the film, one should venture beyond major cities. A drive through Mazovia or Łódź Voivodeship during the off-season, especially in late autumn or winter, reveals the very landscapes portrayed in the film. Its beauty is subtle and melancholic, found in the stark silhouette of treelines against a grey sky, the lonely glimpse of a distant farmhouse, and the immense, humbling silence of the open plains.
The Forest of Buried Truths
The journey’s endpoint, and the film’s emotional peak, is a small forested area. Here, guided by the reluctant son of the man who killed their family, they discover an unmarked grave. The forest in Ida is deeply unsettling—outwardly serene, a quiet pine grove, yet harboring a horrific secret. This duality is key to understanding Poland’s wartime history. Polish forests were both places of refuge and sites of massacre. They sheltered partisans and fleeing families but also conceal countless mass graves, the final resting places of Holocaust victims and others caught in atrocities. Pawlikowski taps into this profound national trauma. The scene of digging in the cold earth is agonizingly quiet and deliberate, with only the scrape of the shovel and winter wind sighing through the trees. For a visitor, standing in a Polish forest can be profoundly moving, especially with this knowledge. There is a weight to the silence—a place that feels both eternal and haunted. It serves as a powerful reminder that history’s most terrible acts often occur not in city centers, but in quiet, anonymous places absorbed into the landscape—until someone dares to unearth the truth.
Capturing the Spirit: A Photographer’s and Traveler’s Guide
A pilgrimage to the sites featured in ‘Ida’ is less about ticking off a checklist and more about immersing oneself in the atmosphere. It calls for a different way of seeing, a slower pace, and a willingness to engage with the quiet melancholy and deep history of the landscape. This journey is ideally suited for the thoughtful traveler, the photographer, and anyone moved by the film’s evocative visual poetry.
The Monochrome Aesthetic: Viewing Poland Through Pawlikowski’s Lens
To truly connect with the essence of ‘Ida,’ one must embrace the filmmakers’ contemplative gaze. The film’s black-and-white cinematography is not merely a stylistic choice; it is crucial to its meaning. By removing the distraction of color, it compels the viewer to focus on texture, form, light, and shadow. This approach universalizes the story, giving it the feel of a timeless fable while simultaneously grounding it in the stark reality of a photographic moment from the past. When visiting Łódź and its surroundings, try to see the world through this lens. Resist the urge to capture only the grand or beautiful. Instead, seek out the ‘Ida’ moments: the texture of a crumbling brick wall, the geometric patterns of a wrought-iron gate, the reflection of a grey sky in a puddle, or the solitary figure walking down an empty street. For photographers, this presents a remarkable opportunity. Challenge yourself to shoot in black and white and pay close attention to composition. The film is renowned for its unconventional framing, frequently placing characters in the lower third of the screen, dwarfed by architecture and sky. This visual technique evokes a sense of oppression and spiritual yearning. By finding these compositions in real life, you can engage with the film’s emotional language on a deeper level. It’s a way of moving beyond mere tourism to enter a creative dialogue with the film and its setting.
Practical Pilgrimage: Exploring Łódź and Beyond
This journey is simpler than it might appear. Poland is a modern, welcoming country with excellent infrastructure, making independent travel both accessible and rewarding.
Getting to Łódź
While Łódź has its own airport, international travelers will typically find it more convenient to fly into Warsaw Chopin Airport (WAW), which offers numerous global connections. From Warsaw, Łódź is easily accessible via a frequent and comfortable train service. The journey takes about 90 minutes, providing a scenic introduction to the Polish countryside as you travel from the capital to the country’s third-largest city.
Getting Around
Once in Łódź, the city center is easily walkable. The key film locations, especially the tenement courtyards and atmospheric streets, are best explored on foot, allowing for a reflective pace and the chance to discover hidden details that make the city special. For longer distances, Łódź offers an efficient tram and bus network. Renting a car is ideal for exploring rural locations and capturing the spirit of Wanda and Anna’s road trip, giving you freedom to stop in small villages and fully immerse yourself in the countryside.
When to Visit
The timing of your visit can greatly influence your experience. To best evoke the film’s stark, melancholic atmosphere, plan a trip in late autumn or winter (October through February). The bare trees, soft, low light, and occasional dusting of snow will transport you directly into ‘Ida’s’ monochrome world. The cold air and quiet streets heighten the sense of introspection. However, visiting in spring or summer offers a different perspective. The same locations—transformed by greenery and life—serve as powerful reminders of resilience and renewal. This contrast brings a sense of hope that offsets the film’s somber tone, offering an equally valid emotional experience.
Beyond the Frame: Engaging with History
A pilgrimage inspired by ‘Ida’ is incomplete without a deeper engagement with the history the film powerfully evokes. The story of the Lebenstein family, while fictional, reflects a devastatingly real historical tragedy. To honor that memory, a thoughtful visitor should explore the places that tell the broader story. In Łódź, a visit to the Jewish Cemetery is essential. As one of the largest in Europe, it is a vast, silent city of stones bearing witness to a community nearly erased. Walking its quiet paths is a sobering and unforgettable experience. The former Łódź Ghetto area—though not preserved as a museum like Auschwitz—can be explored with a guide or through historical markers recounting the events that occurred there. For deeper context, consider visiting the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw. This world-class museum tells not just the story of the Holocaust but the rich, thousand-year history of Jewish life in Poland, providing crucial insight into the vibrant culture that was lost.
The Resonance of ‘Ida’s’ Poland
What makes a journey to these unassuming, often melancholic places so powerful? It is because the Poland of ‘Ida’ represents a landscape of the soul. The locations selected by Paweł Pawlikowski are imbued with a deep ‘genius loci,’ or spirit of place. These are spaces where the past is not merely a distant memory but a tangible presence, lingering in the architecture, the soil, and the silence. The film has added a new dimension to these sites, transforming a specific courtyard in Łódź or a quiet country road into destinations for international cinematic pilgrimage. Yet, the pilgrimage is not only about visiting where a movie was filmed; it is about experiencing what the film made you feel. It is about standing in a place and grasping its weight, its story, and its silent testimony. A journey to ‘Ida’s’ Poland is a quiet one—a journey of observation, reflection, and empathy. It provides an opportunity to walk through a masterpiece, to see the world through the eyes of a poet, and to connect with a history that, though painful, must never be forgotten. The echoes found there, in the monochrome streets and whispering forests, will stay with you long after you have returned home.
