KARLOVY VARY 2023 Special Screenings
Robert Hloz • Director of Restore Point
“We are bringing sci-fi to our region – that’s where we took the biggest risk”
by Marta Bałaga
- In his debut feature, the Czech director looks to the year 2041, when, if you die an unnatural death, you can be brought back to life – as long as you’ve backed up
Have you backed up today? Let’s hope so, because in Robert Hloz’s Karlovy Vary Special Screening Restore Point [+see also:
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interview: Robert Hloz
film profile], it’s literally a matter of life and death. In 2041, if you die an unnatural death, you can be brought back to life. Just remember to back up your personality every two days.
Cineuropa: There is a whole subgenre dedicated to investigations taking place in the future. Do you also love stories like that?
Robert Hloz: When we came up with this idea of a “great” society, with its new rules, we were wondering how we could explore it. How can you show its good and bad sides? The reason why sci-fi crime stories exist, I think, is because this kind of narrative allows you to visit every corner of this world, meet positive characters and evildoers.
Making Restore Point can’t have been easy. These countries, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Serbia, are not exactly associated with genre.
We are bringing sci-fi to our region, which is not very common. That’s where we took the biggest risk. In the beginning, there were very few people who believed it would be possible. Actually, I was probably the only one [laughs]. But then, as you assure everyone you are not trying to make Star Wars, that it will be more grounded, they start to understand. The problem was that there had been several similar attempts in Czech cinema already, and they failed miserably. Now, people are suspicious of such endeavours. The key was to convince everyone this was a realistic project taking place 20 years from now, so not much has changed. There are no lasers or flying cars.
It's true – you do combine futuristic elements with things that are more mundane. Everyone in the film is still reading newspapers!
We wanted it to feel different from Western sci-fi films, which are glossy and elegant, and where there is glass everywhere. We wanted it to feel more brutalist, more old-school. We thought that if we keep on down the same path, at some point, we will get to a moment when technology becomes invisible. There won’t be any elaborate gadgets – your iPhone will be in your eye. But if that’s the case, if there are no screens, maybe people will want to hold something in their hands again?
You focus on a murder investigation, but apart from that, everyone is still dealing with grief. There is something sad and melancholic about them.
They are trying to overcome it. It’s a world where it’s very difficult to say what’s right and what’s wrong. You are lost. When it comes to Agent Em [Andrea Mohylová], we never see her past. It’s a mystery, one that maybe will be revealed later on. Before that, you are trying to discover why she is the way she is. She is strong – she doesn’t like to feel like she needs help from others. And yet there are moments when she is almost about to crack a smile, and you go: “Okay, so there is this tender being inside after all.”
When you are creating this kind of universe, how difficult is it to make sure everything is understandable? You establish the main concept at the very beginning, and then you just run with it.
We talked about it a lot – while writing the script and also later, during the editing. We know how this system works, how the “restore point” works, but you don’t want to explain things too much. If this were a series, we could probably go into it a bit further, adding something in each episode. But here, I guess sometimes you just need to use your imagination a little. This is a relatively mainstream movie, and it needs to satisfy the audience, first and foremost. You can’t waste too much time on drawing up entire maps.
How do you decide how strange you can go? This world is believable, but odd scenes and characters keep popping up. Like the one who, well, communicates via his teeth.
In this universe, some people support this technology, while others are against it. I wanted to show both sides, because how would I react in the same situation? Would I be against it, knowing there are some moral issues at play, or would I embrace it?
This “dentist” character [played by The Painted Bird [+see also:
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film profile]’s Lech Dyblik] came to life relatively late on, but we really wanted people like him to also inhabit this world. There was a battle over the cost of that scene, and whether we really needed it, but I knew it would be worth it. Everyone loved him. Many characters were sacrificed for this one!
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