Amidst social and economic turmoil, 1990s Polish cinema turned toward heritage. Pan Tadeusz—shot in 1998 to mark romantic writer Adam Mickiewicz’s bicentennial—is Andrzej Wajda at his most nation-building and nostalgic. Adapting the eponymous epic poem, Wajda retains its lyric verse, supplementing Mickiewicz’s rhyming couplets with elegantly swaying camera moves. Set in 1811-12 Polish-speaking Lithuania, the film revels in aristocratic quarrels and interdynastic conflict as two families iron out a decades-long feud against the backdrop of Napoleon’s (somewhat eagerly awaited) invasion of Russia. The film was a popular patriotic event of the highest order: over six million tickets were sold at home (the international release was a bomb), garnering Wajda praise for once again uniting a disheveled nation through images. Prizing extravagant theatricality over historical veracity, Pan Tadeusz stands today as one of Wajda’s strongest and strangest costume dramas, its sumptuous CinemaScope photography evincing a desire to depict the past as it never was.