Directors Adam Ol'ha and Jan Daňhel focuse on the making of Jan Švankmajer’s Insect (IFF Rotterdam 2018) in their brand-new documentary Alchemical Furnace, produced by Jaromír Kallista and Jan Švankmajer (Athanor) and co-produced by the Slovak company PubRes. The film will premiere in Deep Focus section as a part of programme called „Regained“, which establishes a particular dialogue with the history of the cinema. This programme also introduces Icelandic-Swedish-Czech The Vasulka Effect, co-produced by Radim Procházka and Czech Television on the Czech side.

Karel Vachek’s essay Communism and the Net or the End of Representative Democracy (world premiere at Ji.hlava IDFF 2019) examines the history of regimes and revolutions, leaders and martyrs, from a philosophical perspective. The documentary, produced by Mikuláš Novotný and Radim Procházka (Background Films), will be screened in The Tyger Burns section, which focuses on the older generation of filmmakers, showing that their creative urge still burns as brightly as 50 years ago.

After winning Hivos Tiger Award in 2013, Mira Fornay returns to Rotterdam with her new absurd drama Cook F**k Kill (world premiere at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2019) which will be presented in Voices. Czech-Slovak co-production, produced by Viktor Schwarcz from Cineart TV Prague and co-produced by the director herself, is a provocative and absurdly playful take on violence within a family and sexual abuse using repetition or folk tales with an unexpected end.

Czech films regularly appear at IFF Rotterdam. In last 21 years, three Czech directors received the main prize of the festival. Mira Fornay’s My Dog Killer won Hivos Tiger Award in 2013, Bohdan Sláma succeeded with Wild Bees in 2001 and Buttoners by Petr Zelenka dominated the festival back in 1998.