Helena Třeštíková's dream come true. With Forman, she moved Vary first and then herself
Last night at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, director Helena Třeštíková presented the documentary Forman vs. Forman. Overcome by emotion, she began to weep in front of the standing audience.
From Cannes to Karlovy Vary
The documentary about Miloš Forman, the man who gave Třeštíková the idea to follow in his footsteps when she was only a little girl, had its world premiere this year in Cannes. It leans heavily on archival material edited by Jakub Hejna and the director created it to honor the memory of this exceptional personality of world cinematography.
"In May, Miloš Forman returned to Cannes, now he is coming back to Karlovy Vary, where he once biked to all the way from Paris,"
Třeštíková introduced the premiere, and continued by bringing up memories of the summer after 1989, the first summer of freedom, when the director accompanied by Theodor Pištěk arrived at the festival on bikes.
“I saw Miloš Forman's first films as a primary school student and I think they changed my life. Suddenly life, real life, burst onto the screen in those socialistically improbable stories. And I was completely charmed, so I began to claim that I wanted to become a film director myself, due to which I was often a subject of mockery from my peers, because it seemed as improbable as if I were planning to fly to the Moon,” she shared the story of how she actually decided to become a director.
A dream come true
The film is a collage of both private and official archives, as well as autobiographical recollection, narrated by the director's son Petr Forman. The creators also used footage from the Cannes film festival of 1968, where Forman is standing on a beach wearing a swimsuit and thinking about the importance of freedom. They worked with documentaries from Věra Chytilová and Jaromil Jireš and with dozens of other film materials.
"The offer from Czech Television to make a documentary about Forman was a dream come true for me," Třeštíková added.
