My suspicion that Volker Schlondorff is more a doer of good works than a maker of good work was confirmed by this semifictionalized account of a welder in the Gdansk shipyards who became a Solidarity heroine after inspiring a strike that led to Poland’s first free unions. Effectively played by the diminutive Katharina Thalbach, who previously worked with Schlondorff on The Tin Drum, the character is central to the film’s populist uplift, a semiliterate outcast and single mother who changed history through her anger and determination. This 2006 period drama is likable, but its value is more inspirational than historical. In Polish with subtitles. 104 min. (JR)