KARLOVY VARY: Eastern Promises, the industry segment of the Karlovy Vary IFF, will open submissions for the Works in Progress showcase and First Cut Lab workshop on 4 April 2023. KVIFF Eastern Promises Industry Days will run 2 – 5 July 2023 and the 57th edition of KVIFF will be held 30 June – 8 July 2023.

PRAGUE: The Oscar-winning director Agnieszka Holland received the biggest production grant of 931,414 EUR / 22 m CZK for her new project Franz in the latest session of the Czech Film Fund. The results were announced on 8 March 2023.

PRAGUE: The legendary cinema Kino Atlas will reopen in Prague on 21 March 2023 with new operators including filmmakers Vít Janeček, Zuzana Piussi, Václav Kadrnka and Simona Kadrnková.

PRAGUE: The funeral mass for famous Slovak filmmaker Juraj Jakubisko, who died on 28 February 2023 took place in Prague's main St. Vitus Cathedral on 4 March 2023.  The cathedral in the grounds of Prague castle is the resting place of Bohemian kings and Roman emperors. The main speaker at the ceremony was ex-president and family friend Václav Klaus. The black hat that Jakubisko liked to wear was symbolically placed on the coffin.

PRAGUE: Petr Václav’s Il Boemo won in six categories at the 30th anniversary edition of the Czech Film and Television Academy (CFTA) Awards, held in Prague’s Rudolfinum on 4 March 2023.

PRAGUE: The family sports film Children of Nagano / Děti Nagana from screenwriter/director/producer Dan Pánek has overtaken the Czech hit Island / Ostrov by Rudolf Havlík and is in second place after its first weekend. Ant-Man and Wasp: Quantumania by Peyton Reed is currently topping the Czech charts.

PRAGUE: The adventure rom-com Island / Ostrov from Czech director Rudolf Havlík topped the domestic charts for the two weeks and is currently second with 181,338 admissions and 1,348,750 EUR / 31 958 640 CZK gross.

PRAGUE: Arved / Arvéd by Vojtěch Mašek was awarded for best film, best script (Vojtěch Mašek, Jan Poláček) and best actor (Michal Kern) at the 13th edition of the Czech Film Critics Awards. The winners were announced in 10 categories.

PRAGUE: The Czech company Evoke opened the first virtual production studio in the country in January 2023. The 440 m2 studio including 120 m2 LED projection is located in the FZG Klecany studio, in the suburban area of Prague.

PRAGUE: In 2022, Czech cinemas were open for a full 12-month period for the first time in three years. They gathered 13.5 m admissions, which is more than in the previous two pandemic years combined, according to the Union of Film Distributors (Unie filmových distributorů).