I'm a huge fan of Polish director Krzysztof Kieslowski (The Double Life of Veronique, Three Colors trilogy) and the Decalogue is his reaction to someone saying there ought to be a film about the Ten Commandments to counterpoint the sex and violence in late 80s cinema. He made ten. These one-hour dramas aired on Polish television, and if you were to fit them into the color scheme of his later films (Veronique as gold/yellow, and the Three Colors' Blue, White and Red), it would be Gray. Though each film has its own characters, they are set in and around the same gray concrete apartment building in Warsaw. Only one film could actually be called "colorful". But it's the content that truly merits the "gray" label. The films' themes aren't really one-for-one with each of the Commandments, but rather explorations of how several of them could contradict one another. Morality isn't a black and white thing that can be codified the way religion sometimes tries to, and Kieslowski's characters are trapped in ethical puzzles that surprise and confound by their anti-formulaic presentation. The stories character-based, the endings poignant by their ambiguity. None of them left me cold, and I wish I'd watched them with other people, because each deserved a good discussion afterwards. A great achievement.

Television should aspire to achieve this level of quality more often. How amazing Keislowski's capacity to look into human souls and propose sceneries for our capacities for bad and good. Deep and cruelly ironic view of humans immersed in Christian values that struggle with ideas of their own, and what faith has in store.

Even tough the stories are mostly unrelated,the same apartment complex plays an important role in all the episodes; maybe representing the unity of a more community, the church and its parishioners.

Uneven but a monumental achievement overall. Four episodes - 1, 5, 6, and 9 achieve perfect grades for me.