Vlny is a 2024 feature film produced as a co-production of the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. It was written and directed by Jiří Mádl; the film is in colour and runs for 131 minutes [1].
Subject
According to the description on the Crystal Globe website, the story centres on the International Affairs Desk of Czechoslovak Radio. It is a workplace where people with broad horizons and language skills were employed, and where honest journalism was what mattered [1]. According to the description, the film deals with the themes of love, betrayal, morality and hope, and follows a surge of courage in the face of a repressive regime [1].
Czech Television reported that the film returns to the events of the late 1960s, when the Prague Spring eased conditions and the tanks of the Warsaw Pact armies soon afterwards put an end to it. The events are shown from the viewpoint of the staff of Czechoslovak Radio [3]. On the last day of shooting, a scene from the beginning of the story was filmed, set at the suppressed demonstrations of university students in October 1967. According to the television station, these became a harbinger of the reform process [3].
Crew and cast
The cinematography was by Martin Žiaran, the music was composed by Simon Goff, the sound was prepared by Viktor Ekrt, the editing was by Filip Malásek and the production designer was Petr Kunc. The producer is Monika Kristl. The film was made by the company Dawson films in co-production with Wandal production [1]. Jiří Mádl was born in 1986 in České Budějovice, and his earlier directing work includes the films Pojedeme k moři from 2014 and Na střeše from 2019 [1].
The cast includes Táňa Pauhofová, Vojtěch Vodochodský, Ondřej Stupka, Stanislav Majer, Igor Bareš, Martin Hofmann, Marika Šoposká, Petr Lněnička, Vojtěch Kotek and Tomáš Maštalír [1].
Release
The Crystal Globe website lists the film as a special screening and a world premiere. International sales are handled by the company Urban Sales, and the distributor is Bontonfilm [1].
Awards and relation to real events
According to Hospodářské noviny, the film won the Satellite Awards prize for best foreign-language film, among six nominated titles. The winners of these awards are decided by film journalists from around the world [2]. On that occasion the daily recalled a text in which a witness of the period compares five important moments of the film with how the events actually unfolded. According to the daily, the film is not entirely faithful to history, but it conveys the atmosphere of the hopes of 1968 and of the disillusionment that followed [2].