Monstrum

The House in Karp Lane

1965 · ★ 7.5

The film depicts the fate of the residents of an apartment block in Prague’s Jewish quarter following the invasion by German troops in 1939. Among them is an elderly widow who had once disowned her son and now wishes to bring him to Brazil; there are also the owners of a stationery shop, who are driven to ruin by the German occupiers. The caretaker Glaser, who is of German descent, also comes under pressure when his son is arrested in a communist pub. To save his own skin, he informs on two young people who are active in the resistance.

Noble and Mundane Prague

1949

A documentary film comparing current / everyday and historical / noble aspects of Prague.

New Hyperion or Liberty, Equality, Brotherhood

1992 · ★ 8

From the behavior, discourse, and appearance of individual actors, Vachek composes, in the form of a mosaic, a broad and many-layered film-argument about Czechoslovak democracy in the period of its rebirth, all administered with the director’s ini­mitable point of view.

Mucha: The Story of an Artist Who Created a Style

2020 · ★ 6

Czech painter and illustrator Alphonse Mucha (1860-1939) ranks among the pioneers of the Art Nouveau movement at the end of the 19th century. Virtually overnight, he becomes famous in Paris thanks to the posters that he designs to announce actress Sarah Bernhardt’s plays. But at the height of his fame, Mucha decides to leave Paris to realize his lifetime project.

Cannibal Island

2009 · ★ 6

A disturbing chapter in Russian history is explored in this documentary. In 1933, Joseph Stalin sent 6000 "unwanted" citizens of Moscow and Leningrad to a desolate Siberian island - with no food or clothes to speak of. Decades later this documentary returns to the island.

The Ambush

1969 · ★ 5.7

Idealistic young man supports the party and the new Yugoslavia's communist regime, but soon gets involved in various political and criminal machinations becoming more and more confused about what's right and what's wrong.

Utz

1992 · ★ 5.8

Hugh Whitemore adapted Bruce Chatwin's novel for this tale of a New York antique dealer who travels to Prague to buy the porcelain collection of the late Baron Utz, only to become embroiled in the wreckage of the dead man's unusual life history after he discovers that the collection is missing.

God Does Not Believe in Us Anymore

1982 · ★ 7.3

After his father is murdered by the Nazis in 1938, a young Viennese Jew named Ferry Tobler flees to Prague, where he joins forces with another expatriate and a sympathetic Czech relief worker. Together with other Jewish refugees, the three make their way to Paris, and, after spending time in a French prison camp, eventually escape to Marseille, from where they hope to sail to a safe port.

SS-3: The Assassination of Reinhard Heydrich

1992 · ★ 4

Reinhard Heydrich was considered the most dangerous man in Nazi Germany after Hitler himself. The plot to kill him masterminded in England and carried through to finality in Prague in 1942, is told in this gripping dramatised documentary special. Featuring meticulous reconstructions, coupled with authentic historical film, some of it never shown before the film powerfully presents a vivid account of the only successful assassination of a leading Nazi in World War II. It also chillingly recreates the terrible human cost of SS savagery against the Resistance and the total obliteration of the village of Lidice.

The Last Freedom of Georgy Konstantinov

2019

A film about the dramatic and extraordinary fate of the lonely man who confronted the meat grinder of the communist regime. Georgy Konstantinov, 19 years old, blew up Stalin's monument in Sofia and death passed him by only because the dictator died two days later. He miraculously survived 10 years in prison and psychiatric wards and managed to escape to France. His State Security file numbers more than 40,000 pages. Even today, he does not cease to expose the crimes of the regime with the strength of truth and of his character.

Stalin's Wife

2006 · ★ 8

A historical drama about the tragic fate of Nadezhda Alliluyeva, a woman who remained in the shadow of her husband Joseph Stalin. In 1918, 16-year-old Nadezhda married 38-year-old Joseph Stalin, a close friend of the Alliluyev family. The love of Nadezhda and Joseph develops against the backdrop of important historical events - revolutions, wars, arrests, and every year Stalin seizes more and more power. Realizing the terrible essence of her beloved husband, Nadezhda still remains faithful to him. But how long can she withstand this struggle with herself?

We Are Bleach

A multi-awarded 23 minute short film about pansexual punk rockers in a toxic relationship in London’s underground music scene