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PRODUCTION / FUNDING Czech Republic / Slovakia

Czech “rockabilly freakshow” Bourák nears end of shooting

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- Ondřej Trojan is preparing a “dark gangster romantic musical comedy” set in a working-class environment

Czech “rockabilly freakshow” Bourák nears end of shooting
Ady Hajdu (left) and Ivan Trojan (right) on the set of Bourák (© Bára Lockefeer/Total HelpArt)

Czech director Ondřej Trojan is currently shooting Bourák [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, his next feature after the period biopic Toman [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
. Billed as a “dark gangster romantic musical comedy”, the script was written by Petr Jarchovský, who penned the screenplays for Trojan’s previous endeavours Identity Card, Let’s All Sing Around and Želary [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
, which received a 2004 Academy Award nomination in the Best Foreign-language Film category.

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“It’s the story of a ‘displaced’ philanderer and irresponsible father, a romantically inclined car mechanic who, as punishment for his behaviour, is forced by his wife and daughter to sleep in his own car in a garage. In order to survive his unhappy life in these unpleasant surroundings, he lives immersed in a different reality, in the United States during the period 1956-1959, Elvis Presley’s heyday. He refuses to come down from his cloud and face real life and the problems he has been causing through his behaviour,” said Jarchovský. The story was originally conceived as a social drama by Evita Naušová, which Jarchovský transformed into a stylised dark comedy while preserving the social drama at its heart. The movie was initially going to be about a grown-up daughter attempting to save the marriage of her immature parents.

The title role of Bourák, with his dented, pink Cadillac, is played by seasoned actor Ivan Trojan, who also stars in the upcoming drama by Agnieszka Holland, Charlatan [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Agnieszka Holland
film profile
]
. The director said his younger brother was cast against his usual type to play a “hick”. “The ideal situation is to throw the actors and take them out of their comfort zone, and give them either a role they have never played before or a character that has nothing to do with them,” said the director. Bourák marks the first time that Ondřej Trojan has directed his brother Ivan in a film.

The movie is “a probe into the working-class environment of a deteriorating town, where all of the characters live on the fringes of the law – in a grey or even a black economy,” explain Slovakian co-producers Zuzana Mistríková and Ľubica Orechovská, of PubRes, in their producers’ statement. They have worked with Trojan’s Total HelpArt THA on previous projects such as Toman (see the news), the animation Oddsockeaters [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
(see the news), Identity Card and Ema & Death’s-head, currently in development (read the report).

Principal photography will last until 16 October, with two days of additional shooting for some dance scenes in November. The editing and post-production work will be carried out from November until April 2020. The film has a Czech and Slovakian cast, with Kristýna Boková, Veronika Marková, Jiří Macháček and Petra Nesvačilová, and for the Slovakian side, Ady Hajdu, Alena Pajtinková, Petra Polnišová and Milan Ondrík, who won the Best Actor Award at this year’s Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (see the news) for his role in Let There Be Light [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Marko Škop
interview: Milan Ondrík
film profile
]
.

Bourák is being produced by Czech outfit Total HelpArt THA (Ondřej Trojan), and co-produced by Czech Television (Kateřina Ondřejková) and Slovakian production company PubRes (Zuzana Mistríková, Ľubica Orechovská). The film was supported by the Czech Film Fund and the Slovak Audiovisual Fund. The release is scheduled for 28 May 2020, with Falcon handling the local distribution and Forum Film bringing out the film in Slovakian theatres.

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