MAUR film

The Forgotten Book is a story about loss and dealing with loneliness. One day Toni and Levi find a mysterious artifact - the forgotten book - which appears to have a unique value. It becomes Toni's gateway to the fantastic world of dreams and magic.

Tom (4 years old), Suzanne (8) and Derek (10) spend the weekend with their grandparents. But nothing is as usual: Grandpa seems to be elsewhere; Tom wonders where Grandma has gone, she who always tells him incredible stories; Derek is hard at work renovating the old apple tree hut. So following in the footsteps of her ancestor, Suzanne improvises herself as a storyteller to illuminate the house with imaginary and wonderful stories and try to fill the absence of Grandmother. The movie is an adaptation of three tales written by Arnost Goldflam.

Hurikán rushes out to save his favourite beer stand from closure by fetching a new keg to impress the bartender he has a crush on. In a wild Prague district, he faces robbers, cops, and his own thirst.

The native people of the surrealistic land of Superbia, where men and women form separate societies, face the changes sparked by the first equal couple in their history.

We briefly experience with the animal protagnists their story, freely inspired by folk culture, in which good values conquer evil. The film works with a simple well known saying “A friend in need is a friend indeed“, making it accessible to viewers of any age or nationality. This short animated fable “Criss-Cross“ is both a children’s film with a moral, and an attractive film for an adult viewer thanks to its artistic style, combining animation with a cross stitch embroidery

A young girl buries in her soul a memory of a painful moment, when as a child she brought home an injured bird and her father burdened by his own weight of worries didn’t notice her feelings and longing for understanding. The girl took her father’s reaction as indifference and closed herself in her inner world longing for her father’s love and its manifestations. Since that moment she and her dad continued to grow apart, and as an adult she is no longer able to accept his endearments. The father suffers from guilt and searches for a way back to his daughter, trying to revive their lost relationship.

The film based on the poem by Aimé Césair was created for a series of one-minute-long films inspired by the poems of this French poet commemorating the 100th anniversary of his birth. The French original was narrated by Jacques Martial with music composed by François Causse and produced by MAUR film for the company La Maison Garage. The Czech version was translated by the French poet and translator Bertrand Schmitt and narrated for the cinema by actor Viktor Preiss. The film was animated with the demanding technique of oil painted on glass directly in front of the camera and the production in the Anima studio took almost three months during this spring. The same technique will be used for an animated co-production film directed by the French director Florence Miailhe with Lucie Sunková as the main animator.

Humorous as well as educational stories about magical and everyday problems, about devils, miracles, ordinary human vices and wisdom. The graphic design of the stories reflects the humour and the atmosphere of the stories Fimfárum, When the Leaves Fall from the Oak, Franta the Fearless, A Dream Come True, and Greedy Barka, that were recorded by Jan Werich on an LP in the 1960’s and published in a book called Fimfarum.

In a desolate landscape process strange creatures. The foreman of the group picks a suitable spot and the whole multiplying colony starts excavating a pit. They encounter various natural disasters that ruin their efforts – but the colonists always rise from the ruins and continue their work. We do unequivocally sympathise… till the moment when we return to the people’s daily lives.

An imaginative and playful collage of images from the life of cows. A mosaic of small stories from around the world, in which cows experience both positive and negative moments, depicts the life of an animal in a global world and its relationship with man. Visually colorful images depict the cow as a sensitive creature worthy of admiration. The film gives hope for a better world with its stylized poetics, playfulness and humor.

Far, far away, endless fields overgrown with weeds stretch to infinity. A beautiful garden is hidden in the middle of them, and it is carefully looked after by the Gardener. Her endurance is put to the test when a severe storm breaks out and her garden is flooded with seeds of weeds. This innocent encounter slowly grows into a life-and-death struggle. The Gardener tries her best to defeat this elemental force, but her fear and her desire to resist the intruders at all costs puts her entire world at risk.

Lucie Sunková’s short film The Tree is a metaphorical story about the parallels in lives of people and trees, a lyrical poem about birth and death, about the flow of our time and the nature surrounding us, a parable about parenthood and crossing the boundaries of a human (not only) life. It is a story about relations, seeming hopelessness and a happy promise. Used paint-on-glass technique, a pure poetic means of expression ideal for a story like this, forms another metaphoric layer of the film withs its laboriousness and graphic style. The budget of this co-production reached almost 150 thousand EUR and was almost evenly divided between MAUR film and French production company Les Films de l’Arlequin. Both sides were supported by their respective national funds – State Cinematography Fund in the Czech Republic and the prestigious national fund CNC – Centre National du Cinema in France.

In a small town plunged into darkness, two children, Kyona and Adriel, are separated from their parents and, facing the path of exile alone, embark on a heroic journey that will take them from childhood to adolescence, in search of refuge, peace and the hope of finding their family.

Noctuelle takes his job extremely seriously. He is convinced that there is purpose in his craft. He has no doubts that he is on the right side. After all, his magical butterflies bring people good dreams! But apart from good-hearted butterflies, another pair of wings flaps through the silence of the night – wings of a dangerous bat with dark intents.

Will the father-son relationship make the trip into the wild more enjoyable? Are the children really cruel or just playing innocent games? What will the teacher do when everything is already synchronized? Three stories set on a mysterious island. The animated film by Marta Prokopová and Michal Blaško sheds memories of childhood and adolescence into narcotic images and suggestive sounds.

16-years-old orphan Nab lives since birth on a huge ship, which is at the same time a factory and permanent home to several thousand people. For violating the rules, he is banished and put ashore in the Duluong Islands, a harsh place where winter is hard to survive. But thanks to the discovery of gold deposits, Eskimos live there with adventurers, criminals, and local hunters. The only law that rules here is the law of the strongest. The town is called Rosentaal and the plains beyond are full of packs of wolves. Nab leaves the ship with a box of locksmith tools and sarcophagus containing a mysterious living mummy of an Eskimo whose future and destiny will become a mission of duty for Nab.

For Hugo, visiting Chernobyl’s forbidden area is not a commemorative trip. If this young tourist wanders through radioactive ruins, it is mainly to feed his Instagram account. This absurd quest will lead him to discover a population he never knew existed.

September 1989 in the GDR. With the change of the general mood in the country, the life of 12-year-old FRITZI changes as well. Her best friend Sophie has fled with her mother through Hungary to West Germany and the only thing Fritzi has left is Sophie's little dog Sputnik. But Fritzi misses Sophie just as much as her little four-legged friend does. Therefore, she decides to bring Sputnik to Sophie. But there is only one way to get there: over the strictly guarded border. A very dangerous adventure for a 12-year-old girl and a small dog...

In 1920, Franz Kafka wrote 120 letters to writer and journalist Milena Jesenská. A love which filled Kafka’s life with light and hope and, at the same time, illuminates his fears and the darkness in him.

Paolo Piangino is a quiet adult man who lives alone with his cat and loves to cry, because his tears are his happiness. When he feels sad, tears comfort him, when he is happy, his tears give him even more joy. One day people in his town are amazed to find that flowers grow out of Paolo’s tears and thanks to his tears Paolo becomes famous. All his compatriots from the town are excited, they all invite him to visit, hoping for some lucky tears from him. But Paolo is soon fed up with all that hustle and bustle. Secretely he steals away and all that is left after him are several flowers. The people in the town, saddened by his departure, cry bitter tears for him. Who knows, maybe one day even their tears will grow into flowers.