About the Film

From Lech Majewski, one of Poland's most adventurous and inspired filmmakers, comes a visually ravishing recreation of Pieter Bruegel's epic 1564 painting "The Way to Cavalry," presented alongside the story of its creation -- with Rutger Hauer as Bruegel, Michael York as his friend and art collector, and Charlotte Rampling as the inspiration for his Virgin Mary.

With this fantastically talented cast, as well an enormously complex and imaginative digital tapestry, Majewski takes the audience through Bruegel’s depiction of the story of Christ’s Passion, set in Flanders under brutal Spanish occupation in the year 1564.

From the more than five hundred figures that fill Bruegel’s canvas, THE MILL & THE CROSS focuses on a dozen characters whose life stories unfold and intertwine in a panoramic landscape populated by villagers and red-caped horsemen. We are invited to live inside the aesthetic universe of the painting as we watch Bruegel himself at work on his canvas, weaving the web of his painting and piecing together his sketches. Majewski’s captivating visual effects, combining live actors with location footage and striking painted backdrops, create layer upon layer with which to explore and expand upon the narrative in Bruegel’s work.

About the Painter - Pieter Bruegel

 Pieter Bruegel is arguably one of the most famous Flemish painters of the 16th century. Also known as Pieter Bruegel the Elder, to distinguish him from his sons who were also painters, Bruegel spent a great deal of time living and working in both Antwerp and Brussels. Becoming a member of the Painters Guild of St. Luke in 1551, Bruegel became apprenticed to Hieronymous Cock, and eventually married his daughter Mayken. Known for his beautiful landscapes and detailed accounts of peasant life in Brussels, Bruegel tended to obscure his most important and symbolic subjects, such as Jesus Christ and Icarus, amongst the chaos of the everyday routine. Nicholas Jonghelinck, his friend and art collector portrayed in the film by Michael York, owned no less than sixteen of Bruegel's paintings, some of which were commissioned specifically for his household in Antwerp.