Jan Komasa really took a gamble here. Anniversary is his first film released outside Poland, and for his English-language debut he chose to go all in. Well, maybe not all in, but it certainly takes guts to exploit the current state of American society with a political psychodrama. Audacious would be an understatement.
The film got little to no promotion from Lionsgate studios which feared Anniversary would prove too controversial. This is sad for two reasons. First, the film is likely to end up being a box office flop. Secondly, it is a really powerful cinematic experience, one that will haunt you long after the end credits.
It will not flop in Poland, however. Polish people love their heroes, and a relatively young filmmaker doing it in the US (and Great Britain, too; Komasa's second film, The Good Boy, is coming out in 2026) will not go unnoticed. The cinema hall in Wroclaw where I watched it a little while ago was anything but empty. The audience was buzzing excitedly at the start of the screening, and left limping and downtrodden, haunted and traumatised. It is that kind of film.
And yet it is exactly what you would expect from Jan Komasa. If you have seen Hater or Corpus Christi, you have to realise that the bleakness will be gripping and the smiles will be compromised. Gripping is the word here. For all its darkness and ever-impending gloom, Anniversary is extremely watchable. Partly this is due to exemplary acting (Diane Lane, Kyle Chandler, Dylan O'Brien, Phoebe Dynevor - they all excel) and partly due to the meticulous, smart direction. Oddly, the trailer almost makes it seem like a horror film - but it isn't, or at the very least the horror is manifested in a different way. We start with a close-up of Elizabeth Nettles, a young woman who is about to be introduced to her boyfriend's parents at their 25th anniversary party. She is carefully practicing exactly what she is about to say. Because there is a past: she used to be a student of her boyfriend's mother, a radical one, with some hair-raising views of democracy. What soon transpires is that she has actually written a book about the future of America, and the cult following soon becomes reality. The whole thing unfolds in a gradual but totally relentless way. Like a heavy train that just won't stop. It is a chilling, absolutely brutal experience. But God you cannot look away.
Anniversary tackles a lot of things, and some could say that it tries to handle way too much for a film under 120 minutes. There is a difficult question of modern-day academia. Conformism. Democracy. US politics. Family dynamics (there is a particular Thanksgiving Party scene that is some of the tensest and unbearable filmmaking I have seen in a while). However, I would argue that the film deals with all of those issues quite well, and manages to weave them all into one coherent narrative. The most common issue raised by American critics is that the film does not take sides. Which is interesting. Not in the sense that it does actually take sides (it does not), but in the sense that it is viewed as a flaw (and this, I believe, is where we come to the very line that separates Hollywood from European cinema).
There is no moment of respite here, though, not for one second. It is just this one ruthless onslaught, and maybe I do miss a little humour (I don't mean jokes), a little heart - sometimes Anniversary may feel a little too slick and calculated, a little too perfectly conceived and executed. After the first fifteen minutes of the film, the only genuine smile you see in the film comes from Josh (Dylan O'Brien), Elizabeth's boyfriend and future husband. But it is the kind of smile that will fry your nerves and fill you with utter hate.
P.S. Also, just for the record, "Don't Dream It's Over" truly is one of the finest pop songs ever written.
