The last love affair of the writer Franz Kafka with the nurse Dora Diamant is depicted in the biographical feature film that will open the 18th annual festival of German-language cinema Das Filmfest. The audience will see the film called The Beauty of Life for the first time next Wednesday, October 16, at the Lucerna cinema in Prague.
The film The Beauty of Life tells the story of Franz Kafka’s last love. After the premiere at Das Filmfest, Czech cinemas will start showing it on December 5. | Video: Film Europe
In addition to Lucerna, it will be screened at the Edison Filmhub cinema, and the program of Das Filmfest in the metropolis will last until October 20. From October 22 to 26, the festival will move to the Art cinema in Brno, and from November 1 to 5, it will culminate in the newly renovated hall of the Central Municipal Museum in Olomouc. More than 20 German-language films will be on the program.
The picture from The Beauty of Life features Sabin Tambrea as Franz Kafka and Henriette Confurius as Dora Diamant. | Photo: Film Europe
The beauty of life was filmed by Georg Maas and Judith Kaufmann. It depicts the last love affair of Franz Kafka, whose death has passed 100 years this year. At the end of his life in a sanatorium on the coast of the Baltic Sea, the writer met the Jewish nurse Dora Diamant. She became the only woman with whom the writer, already suffering from tuberculosis at the time, lived at least briefly. “Director Georg Maas will personally attend the screening,” adds Karolína Bukovská, representative of the Austrian Cultural Forum in Prague.
The theme of the Second World War appears several times in the program of the show. For example, the feature film Goebbels – The Master of Propaganda promises an extraordinary insight into Nazi propaganda. The story of the German Minister of Propaganda and war criminal Joseph Goebbels, who was able to mobilize the masses and shape public opinion in such a way as to justify the brutal actions of the Nazis, will be shown in Prague’s Lucerna cinema by director Joachim A. Lang and actor Robert Stadlober.
Another film called With love, Your Hilde was inspired by the communist resistance group Red Orchestra, which operated in Berlin until 1942 and, among other things, drew attention to the hardships experienced by Jews.
The festival will also offer an adaptation of the bestseller Polednice by writer Julia Franck, which was filmed by Austrian director Barbara Albert. The historical drama follows the fate of a Jewish heroine whose life plans are severely affected by the Second World War.
The program also includes the directorial debut of the well-known actor Daniel Brühl, who already brought the film Neighbor in the Summer to the Karlovy Vary festival, or Scorched Earth, set in the Berlin underworld. One of the stars of the series Babylon Berlin, actor Mišel Matičević, will play the main role of a professional robber.
The organizers call Plastic Fantastic “probably the most important” climate documentary of last year, which provides insight into the thinking and actions of representatives of the plastics industry. He confronts their views with the attitudes of scientists and environmental activists. Director Isabella Willinger will attend the screening at the Edison Filmhub cinema in Prague.
An accompanying program will also be part of this year’s Das Filmfest. A panel discussion on the status of women in German, Austrian and Swiss film will take place on Thursday, October 17, at the Kavalírka Cinema in Prague, which will be attended by female professionals from these countries. Several films from this year’s program, including The Beauty of Life, will later receive a distribution premiere.