- Occupation
Producer, Director - Country
Czech Republic
Počtová Jana
Hell for Leather
Forth-year students of the Alternative Theatre at Prague Theatre Academy together Jana Počtová, a documentary filmmaking student, decided to take part in an experiment. They spent five days locked in the Řetízek Theatre Studio to try to investigate new possibilities of a creative process in an unusual environment under atypical conditions. They wanted to find out more about themselves and their schoolmates, who had been more their colleagues than friends. 120 hours later the sealed laboratory opens for spectators and they can immediately observe the results of the experiment... It is remarkable how easily the filmmaker adapts to this environment and remains completely in the background although she is the one who observes and asks questions. The camera becomes a direct mirror for the characters, a partner in an open confession. Under such extreme conditions, the actors themselves finally leave the stage and become "free". Ironically, their prison turns into the only place where they can find peace. The film is an exceptional probe into the souls of young people, a documentary about a theatre and the backstage of improvisation, a psychological study of where the game starts and ends in the real life, where the stylisation ends and natural emotional being begins.
ESHQ
What is love like in the Muslim world? How do Afghan women perceive their ideal partner and how do they reconcile themselves with the tradition of arranged marriages? Jana Počtová, a student at FAMU (Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague), went to Afghanistan and in very personal interviews with the local women she tries to delve into their mentality. "Falling in love is good only for teenagers. For adults it is an improper emotion and a sign of weakness," says Fawzia, a factory manager and mother of eight children. Laila who is still single is also convinced that should her husband ever beat her, it is better to be killed than to ask for a divorce. That would cast a bad light on her family and she herself would become the target of slander and rejection. In her Bachelor's film the talented Jana Počtová looks into a world where the Western concept of marriage appears to be something that is difficult to understand and the meaning of love is completely different.
AdamEve Šiktanc
A portrait of poet Karel Šiktanc reflected in his poem "Adam and Eve". FAMU, Department of Documentary Film (2nd year)
People On the River
A freight ship with a crew of three - a captain, mechanic and a sailor - sailing on the river... Unfulfilled dreams, faraway oceans, ordinary lives, uncommon jobs.
Children of Stalinism
„CHILDREN OF STALINISM“are those who grew up in 50s in communist Czechoslovakia and experienced the Velvet Revolution. They opened up for the documentaries to give a testimony of the past. The communist regime robbed them of their childhood, they have often never seen one or both of their parents, or not until they came back from the communist prisons. They often ended up in the care of their relatives or in institutional care, at worst. They were labeled “children of the enemy”, or “criminals’ children” and were deprived of opportunities to get higher education, and condemned to live at the margins of the society. They were not guilty of anything, but had to live lives of sinners. This goes like a red thread through all fourteen 26 minutes long parts of “Children of Stalinism” series. The parts of the series are not only testimonies of political prisoners and their families as seen through the eyes of their children, but they also attempt to understand and mediate main protagonists’ life as they live it now and as it was shaped by their difficult past.
Snow Fields of Ivan Hartl
Every era represents a certain phenomenon and every group of people creates its own myths and heroes. To some, Ivan Hartl has become such a hero. The film combines the two lives of Ivan Hartl; the life of his past he has been living since he left his home and his current life as an artist and voluntary “homeless” man in London. The film is about the search for connections to home and the fear of returning as his native country has become an ideal which he is unwilling to destroy. It also explores the loss of identity, language and friends, questioning the very nature of home. Ultimately, the film sets out to find out more about Ivan Hartl and his true self.
Generation Singles
The documentary about people without partners is a probe into human relations in present-day Czech Republic, a contemplation of diverse forms of hope and disillusion. It deals with sexuality, causes of infidelity, reasons for divorces, and transformations of traditional partnership and family models. The life of one of the female protagonists has a surprising denouement in the epilogue and the destinies of the protagonists after the documentary was made are described in the final credits. “On the basis of the portraits of several people I would like to open up the singles theme. I would like to create a platform for discussion, I would like to stop and try to understand at least a little what is happening around us,” says director Jana Počtová.
The Club
What is the Prague’s Akropolis Palace and what is it like? What kind of people have given it its current form, and how do they see the club and themselves? What kind of people visit the club every night? – Department of documentary film, FAMU – 5th year (graduate film
Forth-year students of the Alternative Theatre at Prague Theatre Academy together Jana Počtová, a documentary filmmaking student, decided to take part in an experiment. They spent five days locked in the Řetízek Theatre Studio to try to investigate new possibilities of a creative process in an unusual environment under atypical conditions. They wanted to find out more about themselves and their schoolmates, who had been more their colleagues than friends. 120 hours later the sealed laboratory opens for spectators and they can immediately observe the results of the experiment... It is remarkable how easily the filmmaker adapts to this environment and remains completely in the background although she is the one who observes and asks questions. The camera becomes a direct mirror for the characters, a partner in an open confession. Under such extreme conditions, the actors themselves finally leave the stage and become "free". Ironically, their prison turns into the only place where they can find peace. The film is an exceptional probe into the souls of young people, a documentary about a theatre and the backstage of improvisation, a psychological study of where the game starts and ends in the real life, where the stylisation ends and natural emotional being begins.
ESHQ
What is love like in the Muslim world? How do Afghan women perceive their ideal partner and how do they reconcile themselves with the tradition of arranged marriages? Jana Počtová, a student at FAMU (Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague), went to Afghanistan and in very personal interviews with the local women she tries to delve into their mentality. "Falling in love is good only for teenagers. For adults it is an improper emotion and a sign of weakness," says Fawzia, a factory manager and mother of eight children. Laila who is still single is also convinced that should her husband ever beat her, it is better to be killed than to ask for a divorce. That would cast a bad light on her family and she herself would become the target of slander and rejection. In her Bachelor's film the talented Jana Počtová looks into a world where the Western concept of marriage appears to be something that is difficult to understand and the meaning of love is completely different.
AdamEve Šiktanc
A portrait of poet Karel Šiktanc reflected in his poem "Adam and Eve". FAMU, Department of Documentary Film (2nd year)
People On the River
A freight ship with a crew of three - a captain, mechanic and a sailor - sailing on the river... Unfulfilled dreams, faraway oceans, ordinary lives, uncommon jobs.
Children of Stalinism
„CHILDREN OF STALINISM“are those who grew up in 50s in communist Czechoslovakia and experienced the Velvet Revolution. They opened up for the documentaries to give a testimony of the past. The communist regime robbed them of their childhood, they have often never seen one or both of their parents, or not until they came back from the communist prisons. They often ended up in the care of their relatives or in institutional care, at worst. They were labeled “children of the enemy”, or “criminals’ children” and were deprived of opportunities to get higher education, and condemned to live at the margins of the society. They were not guilty of anything, but had to live lives of sinners. This goes like a red thread through all fourteen 26 minutes long parts of “Children of Stalinism” series. The parts of the series are not only testimonies of political prisoners and their families as seen through the eyes of their children, but they also attempt to understand and mediate main protagonists’ life as they live it now and as it was shaped by their difficult past.
Snow Fields of Ivan Hartl
Every era represents a certain phenomenon and every group of people creates its own myths and heroes. To some, Ivan Hartl has become such a hero. The film combines the two lives of Ivan Hartl; the life of his past he has been living since he left his home and his current life as an artist and voluntary “homeless” man in London. The film is about the search for connections to home and the fear of returning as his native country has become an ideal which he is unwilling to destroy. It also explores the loss of identity, language and friends, questioning the very nature of home. Ultimately, the film sets out to find out more about Ivan Hartl and his true self.
Generation Singles
The documentary about people without partners is a probe into human relations in present-day Czech Republic, a contemplation of diverse forms of hope and disillusion. It deals with sexuality, causes of infidelity, reasons for divorces, and transformations of traditional partnership and family models. The life of one of the female protagonists has a surprising denouement in the epilogue and the destinies of the protagonists after the documentary was made are described in the final credits. “On the basis of the portraits of several people I would like to open up the singles theme. I would like to create a platform for discussion, I would like to stop and try to understand at least a little what is happening around us,” says director Jana Počtová.
The Club
What is the Prague’s Akropolis Palace and what is it like? What kind of people have given it its current form, and how do they see the club and themselves? What kind of people visit the club every night? – Department of documentary film, FAMU – 5th year (graduate film
Fragments of P. K.
An original portrait of Pavel Koutecký, one of the most outstanding Czech documentary filmmakers. The film will utilize Koutecký's footage that was left unfinished, as well as his correspondence, scripts, photos, etc. The nature of all the original material will be shifted so that it no longer refers to the topic but to the filmmaker himself.
An original portrait of Pavel Koutecký, one of the most outstanding Czech documentary filmmakers. The film will utilize Koutecký's footage that was left unfinished, as well as his correspondence, scripts, photos, etc. The nature of all the original material will be shifted so that it no longer refers to the topic but to the filmmaker himself.
Jana Počtová studied in the Faculty of Philosophy, Charles University, Department of Theory and History of Drama, then at the Film and TV School of Academy of Performing Arts In Prague, Department of Documentary Production. During her studies she went on a study visit to Paris at Université Paris 8. She has cooperated with several film festivals: Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, One World, and Academia Film Olomouc. She cooperated with the foundation People in Need on film projects about refugees and a project about daughters of political prisoners, Dcery 50. let / Daughters of 1950s. She has worked on a Czech-German Fund For The Future project Živá paměť / Livig Memory for the German government. In doing so she collected testimonies of slave labourers working in Germany during World War Two and testimonies of former prisoners from concentration camps.
2004 ESHQ2005 Vostodvacet / Hell For Leather2008 Palác Akropolis - Akráč / The Club2011 Generace Singles / Generation Singles2011 Sněhová pole Ivana Hartla / Snow Fields of Ivan Hartl2011 Oći tygra /Eyes of The Tiger
Ars Vita
Jerevanská 1
100 00 Praha 10
Jerevanská 1
100 00 Praha 10
Catalogue of Upcoming Czech Documentary Films - 2012