Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 

Friday is the first day of the festival, but tickets for Friday’s performances already went on sale on Thursday. So we’d like to take this opportunity to recommend certain less conspicuous films from tomorrow’s festival programme.

We’ll be giving our film tips throughout the festival, available on kviff.com from midnight the previous day, so that you can get an idea of what’s on offer before advance ticket sales start for the following day. We hope you have a thoroughly enjoyable time watching films at the festival!

Humpday
What would you do if your best friend wanted to make an “innovative homosexual porn film” with you? This is just the question staid Ben is trying to answer when he meets up after many years with his friend Andrew in the independent American film Humpday by Lynn Shelton. The film took away the Special Jury Prize from Sundance and was screened at Cannes. This witty and spontaneous movie transforms an initially bizarre idea, drummed up by the heroes during a drunken party, into a catalyst of events which might even change the lives (and perhaps also the sexual orientation) of its protagonists. The inscrutable twists of the plot moreover turn this entertaining, yet also strangely wintry film, into something of a tense thriller: The whole way through, the audience is dying to know whether both heroes will really be able to transcend convention, and themselves as well.
Screenings:
1C6 - 3.7., 18:30, Kino Čas
3R5 - 5.7., 22:00, Richmond
8P4 - 10.7., 19:00, Pupp

Baba
The inflatable cinema Espace Dorleans will be hosting a screening of Zuzana Špidlová’s Baba as part of the section devoted to the best works from the Short Film Festival. It was with this film that the FAMU student won the Cinéfondation section at this year’s prestigious Cannes film festival. The film tells the story of an adolescent girl who has to take care of her infirm granny. She undertakes her work with considerable antipathy towards her charge, and things take a turn for the worse, ultimately heading towards a dramatic struggle for survival… This, one of the strongest student films in recent years, is included in an equally strong collection from the Prague Shorts festival – practically all the films are truly exceptional and are certainly worth seeing.
Screenings:
1E3 - 3.7., 16:00, Espace Dorleans
455 - 6.7., 21:30, Kinosál B
854 - 10.7., 18:30, Kinosál B

(ih)