Martin Šulík
Directing
Biography
Martin Šulík is a Slovak film director. He studied film directing at the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava from which he graduated in 1986. His 2011 film Gypsy was selected as the Slovak entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 84th Academy Awards, but it did not make the final shortlist.
Born: October 20, 1962
Place of Birth: Žilina, Czechoslovakia [now Slovakia]
Known For
The Teacher
The principal of an elementary school calls a special parents meeting after it’s alleged that the seemingly empathetic and kindly-looking teacher Mrs. Drazděchová uses her students to manipulate their parents.
Servants
Michal and Juraj, two students of a theological seminary in totalitarian Czechoslovakia, must decide if they'll choose the easier way of collaboration, or if they'll subject themselves to the surveillance of the secret police.
The Man with Hare Ears
Josef is a writer aged sixty, who thinks that nothing can surprise him any more. One evening, though, his phone rings and he finds himself caught up in a series of events that turn his world upside-down. His best friend – also a writer – tries to commit suicide; his young girlfriend Katka tells him she’s pregnant; and the man with hare ears – his alter ego from one of his stories – appears to him in everyday situations.
Buko
After losing her husband, Jarmila finds herself at a crossroads in her life, where she must decide whether to patiently "wait out" the rest of her life or rebel and throw herself into an adventure with an uncertain outcome. Despite the well-meaning advice of her adult children, she chooses the latter. This involves living in a cottage in the romantic wilderness of the Mácha region, which her husband particularly loved. In addition, he bequeathed her a retired circus horse named Buka in his will, which at first glance seems like a cruel joke, because Jarmila is afraid of horses. With the help of her neighbors, she decides to face the situation head-on and soon discovers that, although it didn't seem like it at first, it is precisely this horse that could bring happiness back into her life.
Prague Stories
A four-story omnibus depicting different Czech slices-of-life from the titular city.
Kára plná bolesti
War takes its cruel toll, which everyone must pay. It hits a small Slovak village especially hard, where the struggle for a bare life becomes a test of human character. For two impoverished friends, Jakub and Maja, struggling through poverty is more than difficult. Jakub delivers sour milk from somewhere on his cart to the entire village and lives in a dilapidated house with his sister Tereza, whose caregiver and guide through life is the experienced woman Mara, who provides herself with money from seduced soldiers. Maja, on the other hand, is a foundling and homeless man who does whatever he can to survive the next day. The only consolation for the two inseparable friends are the circulating tales of a kind of promised land, where there is no poverty or hunger, and where they could both go. Only this vision, this idea alone keeps the two of them and the rest of the village on their feet, and gives them hope for a better tomorrow.
The Truth Is All There Is
Eduard Grečner. Film director, dramaturge, publicist and poet. A talented fi lmmaker with precise artistic goals which, due to circumstances and the times, he was not always able to realise. Refl ections on the ideological and aesthetic starting points he consecutively followed during his creative career, [as well as] on the meaning and mission of art and the principles that art should never abandon. [It is] about reality limiting the freedom of artistic expression, confl icts with power and the consequences that Eduard Grečner – a human being and an artist – decided to face without ever compromising his own views and conscience, because the truth is all there is.
Filmography
as Notary
as Physician
as Petr's Friend (segment "Absolutní láska")