RTVS

In the 1980s, Anna, a Czech sprinter, starts training for the Olympics. After she collapses during training, she learns she is being given steroids and decides to stop using them until her mother helps the coaches give them to her.

Grumpy handyman Laco loses everything to a group of mobsters. Now wheelchair-bound and with his life spiraling, it's his new friend Gabo, a local Roma who helps Laco see things with a new perspective. Revenge is sweet.

It’s the 1940s. The Slovak state witnesses the rise of nationalism and it’s not an auspicious time for minorities. The turbulent social mood also impacts the widow Marika, who loses her job in an Aryanised dressmaker’s shop. Given the increasing anti-Hungarian sentiment she shuts herself away, particularly since she is harbouring a little Jewish boy. Despite this she still finds herself singled out by two men: a German Nazi officer and a captain of Slovakia’s Hlinka Guard. This drama by Slovak director Iveta Grófová is an adaptation of the novella of the same name by Peter Krištúfek, which conjures up the dramatic atmosphere of wartime Slovakia. The story of a fragmented era, which forces the protagonists to confront complex dilemmas, is told not only through words, but also by way of a powerful visual language. Sandra Hezinová (kviff.com)

In the heady days of the 1968 Prague Spring, a group of Czechoslovak Radio journalists risk not just their careers but their lives to distribute independent news amidst national and regional tumult. Orphaned brothers Tomáš and Pája are caught in the struggle for freedom. The elder, Tomáš, is a radio technician working at the station committed to defying the Communist Party’s censorship, overwhelming propaganda, and police harassment. When security forces pressure him to spy for them, Tomáš finds himself in a bind where he has to choose between betraying his colleagues or protecting Pája.

Vladimir 518, uncompromising rapper, artist, stage designer and activist, is a rare phenomenon, who not only writes books, but publishes them as well. Today also a respected authority primarily on pre-1989 architecture, he has written not only a major publication on the subject, but also the story for two audiovisual works treating the same theme, which were shot by Jan Zajíček, renowned director of music videos. In addition to the recent TV series we have the eagerly anticipated feature-length film which, through its fascinating and impressive exploration of Czech and Slovak architecture of the latter half of the 20th century, offers exclusive insight into extraordinary buildings and unique individuals living below the Tatra Mountains. Karel Och (kviff.com)

Tony has been glowing since the day he was born and it causes him a lot of trouble. Just before the Christmas, a new odd girl with thick glasses moves into Tony’s house. Shelly has a strange way of expressing herself. Tony is fascinated by her but he is also being cautious at first. Together with Shelly’s flashlight, they explore their house and they are slowly getting to know each other. The kids have to join all their efforts to figure out who’s behind the circuit of dark cracks that sucks out all the light bulbs, even the daylight. It must be because of the ​“Spirit of the house”. A film about being different, about friendship, and first loves… But above all about light and darkness.

A young boy wanders Eastern Europe during World War II.

This is the true story of Freddy and Walter – two young Slovak Jews, who were deported to Auschwitz in 1942. On 10 April 1944, after meticulous planning, they manage to escape. While the inmates they had left behind courageously stand their ground against the Nazi officers, the two men are driven on by the hope that their evidence could save lives.

The Varchals try to celebrate the dissolution of Czechoslovakia, but their father suffers a heart-attack after damning evidence is revealed that he betrayed both country and family working for the reviled secret police.

The principal of an elementary school calls a special parents meeting after it’s alleged that the seemingly empathetic and kindly-looking teacher Mrs. Drazděchová uses her students to manipulate their parents.

A story of Karel Jaroš, an emotionally arid man, whose mother suffers from Alzheimer disease. It is not love, but the sense of duty that stops him from sending his mother to a mental institution. On the other hand, this way he can finally connect with her. And not just with her but also with his teenage son and with himself.

Slovak musicologist Agata Schindlerová, now settled in Dresden, has spent years mapping out the forgotten destinies of Jewish musicians whose lives were irrevocably marked by the advance of nazism. Scenes from the lives of several of them are portrayed in the film In Silence (ballet dancer Alice Flachová, pianist and conductor Karol Ebert, composer, conductor and director of the Dresden Theatre Arthur Chitz, pianist Edith Kraus, and the vocal ensemble Comedian Harmonists), which draws a sharp contrast between the protagonists’ carefree existence working and making music during the pre-war era and the subsequent severe upheaval in their lives brought on by the proliferation of nazism.

As World War II rages on, Villi and Colette are captured and sent to Auschwitz concentration camp. Imprisoned within separate compounds, the lovers must risk their lives to be together again.

Theodora Remundová’s documentary portrait looks at Iva Janžurová’s dramatic and comedic roles in both film and theater, as well as the roles she has played in her family and in social and political life. The director (Janžurová’s daughter) has created a film filled with the truthfulness, sincerity, and capacity for self-reflection of a woman who has devoted her life to acting. The use of clearly staged scenes is combined with an openly acknowledged effort to avoid the kinds of clichés usually found in biographical documentaries to create an organic whole that provides an overview of Janžurová’s pivotal roles while also sharing highly personal and intimate moments from her life. Vít Kořínek (kviff.com)

When the son of Ukrainian immigrant Irina is attacked, the whole city stands up in solidarity with her family and condemns their Roma neighbors, who allegedly committed the crime. But soon another truth starts to emerge.

A mysterious woman returns to her mountain village home to confront her painful past. As she tries to uncover the long-buried truth, the local villagers accuse her of witchcraft and murder.

In 1939, Czech diplomat Jan Masaryk flees to the United States to escape his recent past: Germany has invaded Czechoslovakia and he is now a man with no nation; because, as the Czechoslovak ambassador in London, he failed to win the support of the British and could not avert the fall of his country and the outbreak of the World War II.

A small border town in the south of Slovakia is surprised by the sudden arrival of respected builder Mr. Hampl and his young wife Nada. She catches the eye of an equally young local teacher, Daniel, who is still recovering from his military experience in The Second World War. At first, Nada tries to resist Daniel's charm but her decision is complicated by the scent of flowering agave in the hot summer air. When the agave after 30 years of sleep finally blooms, Nada's primary decision not to give in is permanently void... A simple love story on the surface opens into to a deep, psychological study set in the hot summer of 1947. The Second World War has just ended and the Communist coup is waiting in the wings to wipe nearly a whole generation of Slovak intelligentsia from the history.