Genre filmmaking is experiencing a comeback in Czech cinema. After the genre cross-over involving paranormal horror, splatter and bromance Shoky & Morthy: The Last Big Thing (see the news), the first-ever Czech Emmy winner, the thriller webseries #martyisdead (see the news), and the apocalyptic coming-of-age road movie Brutal Heat (see the news), among many others in the pipeline, another oeuvre exploring the territory of the darker genres is about to see the light of day. Emerging director Lukáš Bulava is currently working on his feature-length fiction debut, Yellow Flowers, which will merge Czech and Italian genre traditions.

Independent, self-taught filmmaker Bulava rose to prominence recently with the feature-length documentary Video Kings, about the phenomenon of the import, copying and dubbing of films from the West in socialist Czechoslovakia. The film secured a nomination for Best Documentary at the Czech Film Critics’ Awards, and it won the Audience Award at the International Film Festival Cinematik Piešťany. Bulava, along with Andy Fehu (Shoky & Morthy: The Last Big Thing), Jan Haluza (First Action Hero) and Adam Sedlák (Domestique [+leggi anche:
recensione
trailer
intervista: Adam Sedlák
scheda film]), belongs to the youngest generation of Czech emerging filmmakers making the most of low-budget genre movies. Yellow Flowers will be based on the cross-over between the darker Czech crime pioneered by Peter Schulhoff’s movies – which starred Rudolf Hrušínský in the main role as Major Kalaš, the so-called “kalašovka” that paved the way for other domestic noir films in the 1970s – and Italian giallo flicks. The story is set in a sleepy, small Czechoslovakian town in the 1970s, where a string of murders occurs. The investigation unearths the dark past of the locals as well as long-buried traumas.

The director confirmed to Cineuropa that he had already chosen shooting locations around his hometown of Karviná and in Poland. Bulava also revealed that he had already cast the characters. A Czech actress who carved out her career in numerous Italian horror films, and who has been dubbed the "Czech queen of exploitation films", Zora Ulla Keslerová (Cannibal Ferox, Antropophagus, Perverse Tales), has promised that she will participate. Keslerová will be joined on screen by Czech-born Italian actress Susanna Martinková (Notturno, Un detective), who has also starred in a series of Italian horror films. US composer Dave Neabore, of Dog Eat Dog, is preparing the music for Yellow Flowers. “Dave composed the music for the documentary Lucio Fulci Remembered vol.1, which stars Zora Ulla Keslerová,” Bulava told Cineuropa, noting the unifying thread between the collaborators he has picked.

Vratislav Šlajer, CEO of and producer at Bionaut, the Czech production outfit and local genre powerhouse behind #martyisdead and Shoky & Morthy: The Last Big Thing, confirmed to Cineuropa that Bionaut would be producing Yellow Flowers. Principal photography is preliminarily set for next year.

You can watch the teaser below: