"Clairvoyant" - Description
Featured in the film is Krzysztof Jackowski most famous polish clairvoyant, who works both in Poland and abroad. He lives in Człuchów in northern part of the country with wife and two children. His main interest is tracking down missing people with help of their pictures and clothes. His achievements are backed up by hundreds of documents gathered by the families of the missing and the police. Jackowski tries to explore the secret of clairvoyance and that is why he is constantly developing his parapsychological knowledge. But he still doesn’t know where the gift that he has gained comes from. The film is a documentary about the work of the polish clairvoyant who constantly helps the police and it describes a couple of cases in which his predictions turned out to be true. The author of the documentary Maria Zmarz-Koczanowicz takes up a subject of a sociological phenomenon of the interest that Jackowski himself evoked. The clairvoyant has already been a topic of a master’s thesis at the law faculty at Wroclaw University. Serious establishments use Jackowski’s gift not only in order to find missing people, but also while tracking down fat cats of the criminal world. Politicians secretly ask about their chances and businessmen look for advice when it comes to investments.
Maria Zmarz-Koczanowicz about “Clairvoyant”:
I’ve always had real luck since I never had to look for ideas for my films. I was always spoon-fed with them by other people. That was also the case of the “Clairvoyant”. The producer Krzysztof Kopczyński listened once to a very good radio feature by Mariusz Marks about a clairvoyant from Człuchów. He gave me a tape with this reportage. The subject, as well as the person of the main character, seemed so interesting to me that I’ve decided to contact Mariusz.
Together we started to think about a film. One of the most popular polish clairvoyants is Krzysztof Jackowski from Człuchów. His life resembles a script of a criminal-sci-fi series like “The X-Files”. Extraordinary abilities of Krzysztof allow him to precisely localize missing people. With help of photographs and clothes he is capable of seeing the place in which a given person – dead or alive – is currently staying. His predictions come true in most cases, which have been confirmed by the police. Also the Interpol uses his skills while looking for hiding criminals. Politicians and businessmen ask him about how their career is bound to develop. He himself sometimes seems to be surprised by his supernatural gift.
Promotional materials of Canal +
Tell the truth, are you doing some kind of magic?
TOPR (mountain rescue organization) demands from Krzysztof Jackowski refund for the search for two teenagers. Dominika and Tomek were found in Czech jail. – I haven’t promised anybody that my vision would be hundred percent true – says one of the most famous polish clairvoyants. In the film by Maria Zmarz-Koczanowicz Jackowski also stresses that he is sometimes wrong. But not the effectiveness of the clairvoyant is of interest to the known documentalist. None of the mysteries would be cleared here. We won’t find out whether a woman who has been looking for four years for her missing parents has found their bodies – according to the vision – hidden under a pile of rusty wire. We don’t know what support predicted Jackowski for Andrzej Lepper, the leader of “Samoobrona”. We cannot, because of the very nature of things, predict whether the lifespan of the Member of Parliament Piotr Żak, was correctly predicted. “Clairvoyant” is a film about God’s or fortune’s gift, thanks to which a life of a normal man, a turner from Człuchów, has changed. It started one evening with the cloud sign above the see. That sign was deciphered and Jackowski doesn’t live as most of his neighbors in the rhythm of “work-machine-home”. He wanted to live differently and so he does… live from the donations from people to whom he is the last resort. He wonders why he was so generously gifted and ponders over the sense of this mystery. Chief inspector Andrzej Jażdżewski from the county police headquarter is helping him. Skeptical but at the same time fascinated by famous countryman. He feels the power emanating from Jackowski – “maybe devil’s or maybe God’s”. – Tell me the truth, are you doing any magic on me? – he asks. This couple’s acquaintance and cooperation, documented with a camera, is in my opinion the most interesting plot of this story. It reminds of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. In the antylegend of this couple the detective had only intuition and the mysteries were solved by his inseparable companion. Doesn’t the clairvoyant owe his fame to the very down-to-earth help of the chief inspector?
Bogdan Wróblewski,"Gazeta Telewizyjna", 9-15 February 2001
Andrzej Lepper:
"... I’ve already been a character of the film „Clairvoyant” in which I participated asked by Canal +. This film was supposed to be about Mr. Jackowski from Człuchów. I was supposed to take part as a person whose future would be predicted. For this “Clairvoyant” I wrote a script myself. I took pictures of some Samoobrona activists and asked Jackowski about his opinion. The cameras were on. Take one and we go. I took out the pictures, put them upside down and said: - Now if you are so clever, tell me something about these people. And I was shocked. He pointed out two men and said that they should have been quickly removed from Samoobrona. They were enemies who would betray me very soon. I thought to myself – something’s wrong here. I passed a second picture to him, where in a group of about hundred people was one of the two men pointed out before. And again on an upside down picture the clairvoyant pointed out the man. Incredible. Of course I was aware of that before. – And what happened to the people he pointed out? – They are not in Samoobrona anymore.
"Polityka" nr 46, 17 November 2001