Overview: 45th Karlovy Vary Int. Film Festival

70 is the new 45. As of today, the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival is in it’s 45th edition, that number would significantly be higher if the communist regime hadn’t insisted on holding a film festival alternately in two locations: one year the fest was held in mother Russia, with the following year it took place in Czechoslovakia. After the iron curtain was lifted, the festival began holding its’ birthday party in the same, current location. From the 2nd until the 10th, the festival will feature several programs of interest with the obvious highlight being the Main Competition section where I’ll be reporting on a good number of the films…here some of the more anticipated titles.

The festival’s opening film is Scott Cooper‘s Crazy Heart, which is still lounging around the film festival circuit and the closing film is the Romain Duris starrer L’arnacoeur (Heartbreaker) – which constitutes as an odd selection for a closer as it’s a rather light, forgettable rom com.

In the Main Comp, there’s a new film by Daniel Burman, often referred to as “Woody Allen from Argentina”. Brother and Sister appears to continue the regular Burman thread of light, talkative dramas. There is also a new film by Jan Sverak, who is best known for his Oscar-winning Kolya. Sverak’s Kooky seems to be a live-action version of Pixar’s Toy Story. You also have the interestingly titled Hitler in Hollywood, a mockumentary about the rivalry between European cinema, and the American film industry. An unique-looking documentary in the competition is The Arbour, about the life of the British playwright Andrea Dunbar.

Naturally, Karlovy Vary is padded with richer offerings from the festival circuit, we have Nikita Mikhalkov presenting his jeered follow up to Burnt By the Sun, Iranian helmer Abbas Kiarostami presents Certified Copy, Michael Winterbottom’s shows up with his Sundance title The Killer Inside Me, Sylvain Chomet presents The Illusionist which had showed up at the Berlin Film Festival, and Todd Solondz comes with his Venice preemd Life During Wartime. Europe is always well represented at the fest. From Spain, The Island Inside features a pair of strong thesps in Geraldine Chaplin and Candela Pena, from Italy, we have the surprise winner of the David di Donatello award in The Man who Will Come dubbed as a moving war drama, and then there is a focus on Belgian cinema showcasing 2009’s The Misfortunates and the TIFF-presented Jaco Van Dormael (The Eighth Day, Toto the Hero) who hadn’t made a film in more than a decade. 

In the Czech film department, Jan Hrebejk brings not one , but two films to the fest. The director known for good hearted comedies (he was nominated for Oscar in 2000’s Divided We Fall – a Czech version of Life is Beautiful) turns in a psychological drama and a documentary film.