D1film

After a painful divorce, 50-year-old Nadia finally finds a good flat for reasonable price for her and her daughter. Too good to be true, and soon, albeit too late, she comes to understand the reason for the bargain. Her close neighbour in the house is mentally ill Valika who terrorises everyone around her. Piussi’s film creates a string of absurd encounters with increasingly menacing effects, but it is – at its core – a fantastically precise film about humanism, its consequences, its possible limits.

The availability of housing is a big topic today. It has the strongest impact on those who participate least in the public debate – low-income households, minorities or single women. The film follows a group of activists around Martin Freund, a representative and member of the Live Brno movement, as they try to persuade politicians in the second largest Czech city about their vision of affordable housing.

In the past ten years, the Slovak citizens’ trust in justice has fallen sharply. Thanks to the access to Threema messages of Marian Kočner, a businessman under investigation in relation to the murder of the journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kušnírová, a vast corruption network within state administration and the justice system has been revealed. Disintegrating the merciless machinery including corrupt judges, rich and influential businessmen, mafia, politicians, and innocent citizens alike, is all but an easy task. Reflecting on the long-term crisis of the Slovak justice system, Zuzana Piussi’s investigative documentary asks whether the justice system with its many failures can ever be corrected.

Fifty-something former miner Jaroslav has always dreamt of a career as a race car driver. In a congenial and jovial manner, he represents not only the charms and struggles (especially economic) of southeastern Moravia, but also the ever more visible chasm between city and countryside. An uncommonly charismatic portrait of a man struggling with the traumas of the past who, with disarming directness, clings to the promise of good luck and a dignified life alongside a new partner.