26/09/2005

Czech cinema is today in a state of disbelief as Bohdan Slama’s new film Something Like Happiness (“Stesti”) won a surprise “Golden Shell” at the 53rd San Sebastian International Film Festival, September 24. Actress Ana Geislerova also won a “Silver Shell” for her performance in one of the film’s two main roles.

Something Like Happiness's triumph was "highly unexpected" according to the film’s production team. Producer Pavel Strnad told the Czech news agency that he is “speechless – considering the kind of competition the film beat for the prize”. Strnad was referring to the features that were considered favorites such as Terry Gilliam’s Tideland, Michael Winterbottom’s Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story, and Stéphan Brizé’s Je ne suis pas là pour être aimé. Strnad admitted that the prize came at the right moment to help retain an interest by Czech cinema goers who have so far gave it a head start in its first week at the box office. Slama’s previous film Wild Bees (“Divoke vcely”) survived at theatres for almost a year after it had also added an award at the Rotterdam film festival to its promotion tools in 2002.

Czech filmmakers have won numerous acclaims in festivals around the world in the last 16 years, including a prize for young directors for Alice Nellis in San Sebastian as recently as 2002; but, at the same time, the prize for best film at one of the most important European festivals or in the US has eluded them ever since Jan Sverak’s Kolya snatched the Foreign language film Oscar in1996.
Something Like Happiness's success in Spain has also made it hot favorite to get the nod for representing the country at the Oscar’s race next year.