Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 2010

History of KVIFF
Founded in 1946 to promote the new nationalized film industry, the festival was originally split between Karlovy Vary and nearby Mariánské Lázně, and didn’t become the Karlovy Vary Film Festival until ’48. From the late 40s the Communist Party nominated films, chose winners and selected guests, turning the festival into a cog in the propaganda machine. After the Velvet Revolution it fell into disfavour, and was close to bankruptcy in the early 90s. In 1994 actor Jiří Bartoška and film critic Eva Zaoralová spearheaded a re-launch backed by the Ministry of Culture and Karlovy Vary’s Grandhotel Pupp. Within a few years KVIFF was the largest film festival in Eastern Europe, serving as a springboard for films like Caroline Link’s Nowhere in Africa and Sergey Bodrov’s Prisoner of the Mountains. The festival has been particularly lucky for French movies, with Amelie, My Life in Pink and The Choristers all screening here before winning box-office success and international awards.

Opening this year´s festival is music-drama Crazy Heart. Last year´s Cinderella story, the film was funded by Country Music TV, made for $7 million and due to go straight to DVD. It was picked up by Fox Searchlight at the 11th hour and given a theater release, winning critical plaudits and two Academy Awards. The movie follows fictional down-and-out country singer Bad Blake (Jeff Bridges, in his first Academy Award winning role) who tries to turn his life around after meeting single mother Jean (Maggie Gyllenhaal). Co-starring Robert Duvall and Colin Farrell, it is the first film by writer-director Scott Cooper, previously an actor.

The films of Powell and Pressburger
This year KVIFF pays homage to one of the great movie partnerships of all time, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger (“the archers”) who made 20 films together including British classics A Matter of Life and Death, The Red Shoes and Black Narcissus. Introducing their films is Powell´s widow Thelma Schoonmaker, (Michael Scorcese´s editor and winner of three Oscars) and Pressburger´s grandsons Andrew Macdonald, producer of Trainspotting, Shallow Grave and The Beach, and his brother Kevin, the director of One Day In September, The Last King of Scotland, and State of Play. The Red Shoes, a film which is to the eye what a Belgian chocolate shop is to the tongue, will be shown in the digitally re-mastered version sponsored by Martin Scorsese, which premiered at Cannes last year.

Tickets
·   You can reserve tickets in advance from 10 am Monday 28th June – 12 pm Tuesday 29th June at www.kviff.com
·   You can reserve up to four tickets per day and two per screening.
·   No discounts are available on reserved tickets and they cannot be bought with a Festival Pass.
·   Tickets are 65 CZK, 50 CZK for concessions.
·   A Festival Pass costs between 200 CZK (for one day) and 1000 CZK (for the whole festival) and provides a 50% discount on tickets, as well as free access to screenings where there are available seats if you arrive 5 minutes before the film begins.
·   Outside of the reservation period, tickets are sold for that day and the next day only.
·   Tickets can be bought or picked up from any of the ticket offices.