The Holocaust in the Czechoslovak New Wave
Film Available 8 th -15 th December; Workshop 15 th December 6pm
Liberating Cinema Film Series Workshop
The Holocaust in the Czechoslovak New Wave
Film Available 8th-15th December; Workshop 15th December 6pm
From the resistance in František Čáp’s Men without Wings (1946) to the images of camps in Alfred Radok’s Distant Journey (1948), Czechoslovak cinema almost immediately began to deal with the history and legacy of the Holocaust as the Second World War came to an end. After an illustrious period in the 1950s, a series of artists emerged in the 1960s who fostered new means of expression, challenged existing aesthetic and socio-political hierarchies, and transformed cinematic depictions of this most important chapter in modern European history. Filmmakers like Zbyněk Brynych, Ján Kadár, Elmas Klos, and Petar Solan combined austere subjects with a free-flowing avant-garde sensibility that contained unexpected intrusions of humor and surrealism.
Jan Němec is one who stands out among the directors who came to constitute the backbone of the Czechoslovak New Wave. Native of Prague, trained at FAMU, his seminal work Démanty noci/Diamonds of the Night (1964) follows the tribulations of two boys who escape from a train leading them to a concentration camp. Lyrically composed, imbued with silence, and an unmatched use of the tracking shot, the film shows the inner journey and strength required of the soul when faced with the cruelty of the outside world.
The Liberating Cinema Film Series is honored to host a digital screening of the film, courtesy of Second Run, available from 8th to 15th December to be followed by the workshop on “The Holocaust in the Czechoslovak New Wave” on the 15th December at 6pm, UK time. The workshop will take place via Zoom and participants will be notified about the link individually.
The workshop comprises a panel followed by a Q&A session with the audience. The panelists include Matěj Strnad, Head of Curators at Národní filmový archiv/Czech Film Archive, Prague, Šárka Sladovníková, Researcher at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague, and the author of the book The Holocaust in Czechoslovak and Czech Feature Films (Columbia UP, 2019), and Jonathan Owen, Independent Scholar (Toronto) who specializes in Czechoslovak cinema, European cinema, surrealism, and the avant-garde.
Liberating Cinema is proud to publish a new essay on the film, entitled “A Masterpiece of Surrealist Subjectivity and Silence: Diamonds of the Night” by Dina Iordnova, Emeritus Professor of Film Studies of the University of St Andrews.
Mina Radovic is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Topic: THE HOLOCAUST IN THE CZECHOSLOVAK NEW WAVE WORKSHOP
Time: Dec 15, 2020 06:00 PM Greenwich Mean Time
Join Zoom Meeting
Meeting ID: 947 9905 7974
Passcode: 454332
Note: The film will be available to view via our website from the 8th December on a password-protected basis with the password provided to those who RSVP by email.
