Bathory, a Czech-Slovak-Hungarian-British co-production with a budget of 11 million euros, the most expensive film in history of Central-European cinematography, had a world premiere July 10, 2008, in both the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

"One million attendance means the overall figure in Czech and Slovak cinemas," said Ales Danielis, director of Bontonfilm

"Bathory´s attendance in Czech cinemas already reached 700,000 viewers with ticket sales over 76 million crowns. More than 300,000 visited Jakubisko´s movie in Slovakia," said Danielis. Cummulative ticket sales for Bathory in Czech Republic and Slovakia surpassed 110 million czech crowns.

In Slovakia, with over 32 million crowsn, Bathory is already the most succesful movie in Slovak history, beating recent leader, Hollywood 1997 hit Titanic, which earned over 26.5 million crowns.

In the Czech Republic, Bathory is now the fourth most succesful movie in history; only Empties by Jan Sverak, James Cameron´s Titanic and Peter Jackson´s Return of the King exceed it.

Bathory is looking next to Oscar competition. The film´s producer Deana Horvathova-Jakubiskova, declares Bathory is one of the very rare chances to win the Oscar for Slovakia.

A European co-production, Bathory has four langauge versions: Czech, Slovak, Hungarian, and English. That could be the problem for the Foreign language film category rules, according to Jakubiskova. "Together with the Slovak film academy, we only need to achieve an exception from the jury of American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences," said Jakubiskova.