First Clip from Roman Polanski’s ‘The Palace’

Purely based on this clip from Roman Polanski’s “The Palace,” the first one released, you can automatically tell you’re in the hands of a master. The way the camera moves, the elaborate staging, blocking, the cinematic atmosphere. It’s beautiful. I’m not saying “The Palace” will turn out great —that Venice out of competition slot might be a red flag — but the filmmaking that I see here can only come from a filmmaker who knows exactly what he’s doing. Pawel Edelman is credited as the cinematographer, and he’s no slouch either.