Don Kichot niewierny: kontrkulturowość niespełnienia

The author analyzes the cultural status of the unfinished adaptations of Don Quixote of Miguel de Cervantes, which were worked on for years by Orson Welles (1955–1985) and Terry Gilliam (1991–2018). Although there are many films about the errant knight, these two projects still arouse interest of critics, viewers and filmmakers. Barbaruk initially puts these perplexing obsessions in the context of the idea of film maudit and the romanticism of interpretations of Don Quixote, but considers that only referring to modernity, which is the embodiment of the film industry, makes it understandable. In the unfinished projects of Welles and Gilliam the author sees the potential for self-creation and interpretation (underlining of openness of Cervantes’s novel and the autonomy of its heroes) and a counter-cultural, critical force aimed at contemporary finality.