In December, when Gomułka went... not Gomułka but Gierek went to the shipyards to talk with the workers to try and somehow calm down what was going on in Gdańsk and Szczecin and Gdynia. I thought about making a film and I turned to the political authorities, not just within the cinema but all of them, asking if I could make a film because this was an historical event that we couldn't ignore. I remember that I was shown material that had been made by a news team that happened to be there on the coast and who had dared to film what our friends... they didn't hold back and they weren't afraid. Those who were employed to make a news reel and a documentary simply filmed events the way they happened. I remember that I was watching this together with the secretary of the Department of Culture, comrade Kraśko, who, after watching this material, turned to me and said, 'See, you can't make this into a film'.