What films can you look forward to at the Czech-German BOO?
The Czech-German BOO competition section offers a selection of 18 of the best contemporary short films from both countries. You can look forward to a wide range of films – from documentaries and animated films to unconventional film experiments and perhaps even some bizarre ones.
The winners are selected by a professional jury composed of female experts from the Czech Republic and Germany. The competition selection, which combines films from the best and largest festivals with promising discoveries, focuses primarily on works intended for adult audiences, but also gives space to films that appeal to children, teenagers, seniors, and other target groups. The festival thus transcends the usual boundaries – we are primarily interested in the quality of individual films.
The Czech-German BOO was supported by the Czech-German Fund for the Future.
To the Core and Further (live-action short films)
The short film program of Czech-German BOO brings four powerful stories that aren't afraid to get straight to the core. From the holiday chaos of 18-year-old Lea in Nine Days in August, through the wild ride of stripper Rudo in Dog and Wolf, to the intimate questions of motherhood and gender roles in Mother Is a Natural Sinner. The climax is the harshly poetic drama Skin on Skin, which brings together a German security guard and a Bosnian worker in a slaughterhouse.
The common theme of all the films is the fragility and strength of people in moments when everything is at stake. The entire series offers an intense look at the boundaries of freedom, relationships, and physicality – with an energy that is not afraid to be raw as well as tender.
Total duration is 87 minutes.
Freedom of Identity (live-action short films)
The short film program of Czech-German BOO brings four distinctive perspectives on freedom, identity, and the boundaries of reality. From the surreal Berlin odyssey Inflatable Bear, Hourly, through the historical drama Death Lives about prison escape, to the sensitive Porcelain, where a child's desire for support clashes with harsh traditions. Finally, Cultural Front follows a young Ukrainian couple in Prague, balancing between their commitment to their homeland and their desire to escape.
All films share the courage to go against fate and seek one's own path – with humor, pain, and raw honesty.
Total duration is 75 minutes.
Memory, Death, and Forgetting (documentary short films)
The Czech-German BOO documentary program presents four different perspectives on the body, memory and death. Fenix opens up the topic of palliative care and sensitive accompaniment of people on their final journey, while Better Man follows three men as they try to cope with trauma through weight training. Ceasefire brings the testimony of a woman who survived the Srebrenica massacre and has been living in a refugee camp for thirty years. The series concludes with the visually poetic Occhio, which connects pain, faith, and science in the search for healing.
A selection of films that look into places where people usually don't want to look – and yet find strength, fragility, and unexpected hope in them.
Total duration is 69 minutes.
Frosty erotic deadly desire and (animated short films)
The animated program of the Czech-German BOO offers six stories that prove that animation can be playful, harsh, as well as gently poetic. From bizarre erotic fantasies in Carrotica, through an absurd encounter with Death in Alan, and strange ritual of frozen and lonely Detlev, to Hurikán's beer adventure in Žižkov. In A Stray, we follow a little boy's escape into a dark fantasy, and The Beetroot transforms a classic fairy tale into a grotesque parallel about authority.
A series that pushes the limits of animated film in every possible direction – from surrealism to raw reality, from humor to spine-chilling horror.
Total duration is 74 minutes.