Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 

The German film Whisky with Vodka was created by acknowledged German film director Andreas Dresen /director of films Halbe Treppe (Grill Point) or Wolke Neun (Cloud Nine)/, who was awarded the Best Director Award at this year’s Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. Whisky with Vodka tells a story of Otta, a famous actor, problematic as well as beloved dandy who knows about film shooting more than the inexperienced director of his newest film. This avails nothing when a local actor who is to be his understudy appears on the set. In this picturesque slightly melodramatic film Henry Hübchen shines in the role of the unreliable star.

The Audience Award was awarded to the Israeli-German-French film A Matter of Size by an Israeli directorial couple. Erez Tadmor and debutant Sharon Maymon tell a story about losing weight with great humour. The quartet of main characters decides to quit being on diets and chooses a different untraditional means – sumo fighting. The film filled with comedic situation is also provoking thought on current society pursuing pressure on the people with overweight.

Cinemart’s acquisition manager Ivana Kosulicova let us know why the company have decided to buy these very two films for the Czech film market: „Whisky with Vodka is a cultivated entertaining comedy by Andreas Dresen, whose film Grill Point was introduced by Cinemart in 2002. In our dramaturgy we focus on continuity; we monitor further works of ‘our‘ authors and we are glad to introduce to cinemas also their newest films. In the case of the film A Matter of Size, the persuasive factor for distribution was the reception of the audience at the screenings during the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. Every festival usually has one film everybody speaks about and which becomes the ‘festival’s hit‘. At this year’s Karlovy Vary IFF it was exactly this film A Matter of Size which was in the end awarded the main audience award. We will introduce both the films to Czech cinemas at the turn of years 2009 and 2010“.

Other festival films in Czech distribution