After a mandatory year off, the festival wishes to show the liveliness and diversity of Czech culture and will present films that may have a connection with France.
The event will begin with a screening of Roman Vávra’s documentary – The World According to Mucha (2020), in the Auditorium of the City Hall of Paris in the presence of Alphonse Mucha’s grandson John, as well as the film crew. Master of Art Nouveau, this exceptional and internationally recognized Czech artist spent his career in Paris at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries and created a new style named after him: the Mucha style.
Children and adults will be able to appreciate another artistic discipline in which the Czechs excel: film animation, represented by Even Mice Belongs in Heaven (2021), a film by directors Jan Bubeníček and Denisa Grimmová, co-produced by the Czech Republic, France, Poland and Slovakia. The Paris premiere will take place in the presence of the main character Šupito and French producer Alexander Charlet (Films du Cygne).
The festival will also address more serious topics: the expulsion of German minorities after the end of World War II is the theme of Bohdan Sláma’s film Landscape in the Shadows (2020). Subsequently, there will be a debate with Roman Krakovský, a historian specializing in Central and Eastern Europe.
The main October program will end with a screening of the film, The Cassandra Cat by Vojtěch Jasný (1963), which was restored on the occasion of this year’s Cannes classics selection. The film will be accompanied by a presentation by Anne-Laure Brénéol-Ithurralde (Malavida distribution).
The Czech language department of the Sorbonne University will host a screening of the film Confession of the Forgotten (2015) by Petr Václav. The next screening will take place in INALCO: From Your Life (2012) by director Kryštof Mařatka. Both films will be presented by the directors.
As has been the tradition since its inception, the festival has been organized under the auspices of the Ambassador of the Czech Republic in Paris, Mr. Michal Fleischmann. Its honorary patron this year is Mrs.Kateřina Lojdová, Czech actress and wife of the Ambassador.
The festival also counts newly among its many prestigious partners the Parisian Council of Europeans with the City of Paris.
For more information: www.czech-in-festival.fr
