BEING
Memories of humanity. From the future.
DRAMATISATION Ondřej Novotný
DIRECTION Kamila Polívková
DRAMATURGY Lenka Havlíková
SCENIC DESIGN Antonín Šilar
COSTUMES Zuzana Formánková
LIGHT DESIGN Pavla Beranová
PROJECTION Pavla Beranová, Antonín Šilar
MUSIC Aid Kid
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR Anna Drápalová
POSTER Terezie Chlíbcová
STARRING Vojtěch Hrabák, Vladimír Javorský, Václav Marhold
DURATION 80 min
PREMIERE 18 December 2024
We are in 2080. After a profound systemic crisis, waves of pandemics, local wars and the total collapse of civilisation, only one-tenth of humanity survived. Nature has reclaimed the empty cities. We possess advanced technology, live in small communities, play sports and eat healthily. Whole human knowledge is stored in electronic libraries, accessible to all. Yet, we still don’t understand the essence of our survival. Therefore, we examine one of the last specimens of the ancient generation. What secrets lie within its genetic code? How did it survive all the horrors?
Or perhaps it is 2016. We are living through the horrors yet to come, lost in the fractured mind of a psychotic spaceman—an aging man making one last desperate attempt to piece himself together.
Either way, a new world is emerging from the ruins of the old one. Thoughts, emotions, memories, and stories—whether personal or collective—must be woven into a meaningful whole. Can this be achieved through cooperation, solidarity, responsibility and compassion?
VÁCLAV KAHUDA (born Petr Kratochvíl, 8 November 1965 – 24 July 2023) was a distinctive Czech prose writer. Originally trained as a plasterer, he worked a variety of jobs, including night watchman at a museum, gravedigger and stoker. From 2017 to 2018, he served as chairman of the Czech Writers Association. In the late 1980s, Kahuda became part of a literary circle that gathered at the Na Staré kovárně pub in Prague’s Braník, where he also played a role in forming the band Tři sestry. His literary breakthrough came in the 1990s with the novels Příběh o baziliškovi (‘The Story of the Basilisk’) and Houština (‘Bushes’). He later authored the novella Veselá bída (‘Merry Misery’), the short story collection Exhumace (‘Exhumation’) and the novel Proudy (‘Streams’). In 2015, Kahuda was nominated for the Magnesia Litera Literary Award for his ambitious novel Vítr, tma, přítomnost (‘Wind, Darkness, Presence’). This work thematically connects to his 2017 novel Bytost (‘Being’), which offers a unique vision of the near future. His life and literary journey culminated in the unconventional, utopian, engagé novel Prám (‘Ferryboat’), published in 2022, in which he elaborated on many of the themes explored in his earlier works. Kahuda’s writing is marked by its layered narratives and ambiguous storytelling, crafting distinctive and immersive worlds. In a 2017 essay for the Czech Radio Vltava, he reflected: “Such as we truly are, such is the world we live in... Context determines everything.” For Kahuda, culture was “above all, a responsibility—to accept, preserve, and then pass on the torch of life on this planet.”
