Jan Budar

Quote:
Rosa (Broken Embraces’ Carmen Machi) is a Madrid housewife who runs a hair removal business from home. As her taxi-driver husband Francisco (Pep Ricart) leaves for work, we watch as she attends to clients and domestic chores. Only beneath the veneer of quiet efficiency there lies a sense of disquiet, that only begins to emerge as her husband goes to bed, Rosa embarks on a night odyssey, and we are invited to follow and observe as the adventure unfolds. From Javier Rebollo, winner of the FIPRESCI award at the 2007 LFF with Lola, his debut feature, comes a new film similarly concerned with a central protagonist on the edge in a cityscape where the impersonal and the bureaucratic predominate. From an economical script (co-written with Lola Mayo), Rebollo builds up a narrative in which much remains suggested and implied. Carmen Machi, one of Spain’s most popular TV actresses, here shows a veritable change of register in capturing the anxieties and concerns beneath Rosa’s veneer of calm competence. The result is a disquieting film from one of Spain’s most distinctive young filmmakers. —bfiRead More »

Jan Nemec, a leading filmmaker of the Czech New Wave, creates an original portrait of one of the most provocative artists of the 20th century: Toyen (Marie Cerminova). As a female artist, Toyen broke through the male-dominated art world to create paintings and drawings often erotic in nature. She co-founded the surrealist movement in her native Prague, survived the Nazis and the Communists, maintained artistic and personal relationships with artists Jindrich Heisler (whom she hid during WWII) and Jindrich Styrsky, and was an active member of the French surrealist circle. Toyen is an essay film which mixes archival footage with re-enactments, poems by Toyen, Heisler and Styrsky, and a visual palette and soundscape that penetrate the interior life of this enigmatic and great artist. “Toyen remains a unique way of approaching an artist’s life…” (Peter Hames, Czech and Slovak Cinema).Read More »

Quote:
A biting comedy concerning the lives of two young people who meet one day in a house in Brno in order to put their ideals of love into practice. A story about a couple not yet prepared for sexual life and a renowned actor no longer in his sexual prime.Read More »