Karlovy Vary 2019: Our festival highlights
The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival returned to Bohemia this year with another feast of cinema from Europe and beyond. Running from 29 June to […]
Karlovy Vary 2018: Our festival highlights
“I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians” Radu Jude’s film claimed the top prize at this year’s festival and it’s […]
Karlovy Vary 2018: Winter Flies review
★★★★☆ Olmo Omerzu’s follow-up to the stinging satire of 2015’s Family Film is another tale of children left to their own devices by negligent parents, […]
Karlovy Vary 2018: Profile review
★★★☆☆ Unfolding entirely on a laptop screen, Timur Bekmambetov’s new thriller Profile seeks to explore the murky world of how social media is used to […]
Karlovy Vary 2018: “I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians” review
★★★★☆ Following 2015’s Aferim!, Radu Jude returns to the topic of historical Romanian anti-Semitism in his furious new satire “I Do Not Care If We […]
Karlovy Vary 2017: Our picks of the festival
The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival returned for its 52nd year from 30 June-8 July. The beautiful spa town on the edge of the Slavkov […]
Karlovy Vary 2017: City of the Sun review
★★★★☆ Georgian director Rati Oneli’s City of the Sun is in a constant dialogue with philosophical treatise and epic poetry, but the humanity shines through […]
Karlovy Vary 2017: A Ghost Story review
★★★★☆ Ain’t Them Bodies Saints director David Lowery channels slow cinema maestros Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Tsai Ming-liang in A Ghost Story, a beautiful meditation on […]
Karlovy Vary 2016: The Noonday Witch review
★★★☆☆ Shimmering corn fields and the blazing midday sun may not seem like natural environs for spooky supernatural horror, but Jiří Sádek’s The Noonday Witch […]
Karlovy Vary 2016: 5 October review
★★★☆☆ “I don’t know where I’m going,” writes Ján Kollár in his diary. He’s recently been booked in for surgery, his chances of surviving it […]
Karlovy Vary 2016: We Are Never Alone review
★★☆☆☆ For those with prior knowledge of his work, Petr Václav’s latest film We Are Never Alone may represent his career thus far in microcosm. […]
Karlovy Vary 2016: Family Film review
★★★★☆ Don’t be fooled by the banal title – there’s a great deal of interest beneath the pastel hues and fine furnishings of Slovenian director […]
Karlovy Vary 2016: Eva Nová review
★★★★☆ “Everyone says: ‘Less emotion, less emotion.’ How can anyone act without emotion?” So complains the eponymous veteran actress in Slovakian drama Eva Nová. She’s […]
Karlovy Vary 2016: Waves review
★★★☆☆ There’s a distinct whiff of Mike Leigh running through Waves, the fiction feature debut of Polish director Grzegorz Zariczny. A social realist drama about […]
Karlovy Vary 2016: Exile review
★★★☆☆ Rithy Panh’s The Missing Picture used clay figurines to represent the non-existent images of the Khmer Rouge’s reign in Cambodia to startling effect and […]
Karlovy Vary 2015: ‘Time Out of Mind’ review
★★★★☆ When Bob Dylan released his thirtieth studio album in 1997, critics claimed that the ominous atmosphere created by producer Daniel Lanois was palpable, but […]
Karlovy Vary 2015: ‘Heil’ review
★★★☆☆ German director Dietrich Brüggemann took the arthouse world by storm last year with his fourth feature, Stations of the Cross (2014) – a restrained, […]
Karlovy Vary 2015: The festival celebrates its 50th anniversary
Karlovy Vary is the festival scene’s best kept secret. The Czech festival may not enjoy the same cachet as Berlin, Locarno or even non-competitive festivals […]