Jan Gogola jr.

Czech Republic

Jan Gogola jr.

director, dramaturgy

Do You Love Each Other?

It is not easy for the present thirty-somethings. They are still licking wounds from the crazy ride on a roller coaster in the nineties and are right at the beginning of the middle age crisis. The society also trashes around in the hard transition. Continuous motion is the only certainty. The only certainty of individuals, funds and relationships. The film tries to define a new meaning of the word family and a whole generation. It tells the stories of three couples in two countries. All of them were brought up in Czechoslovakia during the socialist normalisation. What do all those people have in common? The marriage of a Slovak couple is a mixture of holy pictures and washing powder advertisements. The Bohemian artists Petra and Tomáš are in a constant fight with each other and with their previous engagements. Is the coexistence of René and Radana a real family when they don't want to have children? A lot of questions and a lot of answers create the mosaic of the Generation X. A Generation which has (hopefully) grown up, building its own nests.

Toytravel story

Mr. Marek appears before a committee of successful entrepreneurs. During the televised presentation he is overcome by stage-fright and can only muster a few incoherent sentences. He is trying to convince the committee to invest into a travel agency for toys. Most viewers following his performance on their TV screens as well as the studio audience think that he has gone made or is simply trying to attract media attention. Their shock is all that much greater when Mr. Marek actually finds some investors. Tomio Okamura, owner of a successful travel agency, sensed the hidden potential of this business proposal. And this is how a travel agency for toys was born. A film about the search for certainty, about escaping from the world surrounding us, about why we want to stay children. A film about toys travelling. A film about mass media reality and how it's created. And a film about one dream that came true.

Epic's Ways

Is The Slav Epic truly "a child who died at birth?" On the background of a journey of the twenty magnificent paintings film investigates in several thematic lines phenomena associated with a perception of the majestic legacy of Alphonse Mucha and his own - in many ways contradictory - personality. Art historians, philosophers, politicians, heirs, Japanese visitors, Czech parvenus and American philanthropists dispute and complement each other on various tableaux vivants, weaving a tissue of reflection which - although not easily fathomable - soundly proves The Slav Epic to be a baby still bloody alive.

Wlaldli: Our Own Island

Waladli, Our Own Island is an anthropological essay about the refugees of the modern western society: People who leave everything behind; their well paid steady jobs and long term commitments to travel the world in search of “identity”, the meaning of life, themselves. They come to look for this in the most unlikely places; places that in principal lost its identity as the result of european colonialism, the countries of the so called third world. One of these place is a small island in the Caribbean called Antigua. It has been driven out of its own roots by the indirect ancestors of the same people, who now come here expecting a certain therapy from the space itself. Our western refugees come over here equipped with self-help books and meditation apps, they have ideas on how to learn self-love and confidence. These ideas come in contrast with the reality of the life of the island's locals. This conflict offers often absurd and comic situations, portraying the lost in itself face of the post colonialist world.

Slav Epic Complex

Do we have an "epic" complex in a sense that we see “all too epic” as a relict of intentions that wanted to include everything in certain sphere? Does the Slav Epic has a complex of us who have not been able to agree for more than a hundred years, where is her place - permanent residence and sense? What happens when - in the midst of this obscurity - Alphonse Mucha's Slav Epic all of the sudden visits Japan?

Truthvision

A pensioner from a czech borderlines, Petr Richard Ortek, provides in his office his own youtube television and he mostly broadcasts a antiimigrant and antiislamophobic news three times per week. He lives together with his wife and his opinion mate Petr Weidenmann: 30 years old, cured alcoholic. Petr moved in also with his old and sick to death dad, that needs everyday care. All of them are connected by esoteric faith in supernatural creatures, space energies and extraterrestrial civilizations. Petr Richard Ortek himself visited civilization on Venus planet and other constellations. Who is Petr Richard Ortek and where his distrust to the outside world comes from? Is it possible to highlight people from the edge of the world and even the space, that they will not look like fools?

Human Beeing

The relationship between people and bees is one of the best mapped phenomena in human history. In most cultures, the honey bee used to be considered a sacred animal and enjoyed great respect. Today, due to our irresponsible interventions in nature, it is facing extinction. Together with Honeymen, two amateur beekeepers from Brno, we set out to search for an answer to how to save the bees. However, it soon becomes clear that it is not only the bees that are dying; it is also something in us. Human Beeing is a reflection upon modern humans losing their relationship both to nature and to themselves. It is not a film about the bees but with the bees. It is about humility, faith and dying humanity at a time of increasing dominance of technology.

Czechoslovak Electronic Image

The film happens to be directed by the granddaughter of Radek Pilař, wellknown creator of several beloved Czech children animated series such as Rumcajs, Manka a Cipísek, and somewhat less known as a pioneer of video art in Czechoslovakia. The documentary brushes the dust off of those old VHS cassettes to get a glimpse of early electronic images in our country and uncover the yet unmapped history of pre-revolution Czech video art. Petr Skala, Woody Vasulka, Jaroslav Vančát, Tomáš Kepka, Lucie Svobodová, Pavel Scheufler, Ivan Tatíček, Věra Geislerová, Roman Milerský – decades later they all still share their enthusiasm, obsessive curiosity, and futuristic visions about the use of new technologies for artistic expression.

Elephant Wars

Africa. We dream about it as kids, as adults we see it in the TV as something exotic and dangerous. Some of us are not afraid to make our dreams come true, some of us are not afraid to leave safe old Europe and to seek an adventure in the lands, that are for common Europeans still new and mysterious. And sometimes our goals are more noble. "I go there to help, to save the elephants, people, planet! It´s something I have to do," we say. But is it about helping Africa?

Forgotten War

Nazar works in Kiev, Ukraine, as a screenwriter. Together with his wife and small son, they live peacefully and nothing indicates that this is about to change. Towards the end of 2013, however, the Maidan square in central Kiev sees masses of protesters who oppose the decision of president Viktor Yanukovych who refused to sign the pending association agreement with the EU. Foreign journalists flock to Kyiv to report from the mass protests and Nazar is one of those who provide them with intel. He becomes a fixer – a translator and a guide for teams of journalists. Soon he realizes that he likes to work in extreme conditions. When, two months later, an open war breaks out in the East, he guides the journalists through the key events of the conflict. He sees the development first-hand and together with the journalists, he creates the testimony that then travels the globe. Soon, however, the war is forgotten. The web documentary The Forgotten war provides a testimony about a conflict that had raged in the Eastern Ukraine for almost four years now. As a guide, Nazar tries to give objective causes of the war, he leads the viewer through the Donbass area, hinting at the complicated local history and the pride of the local miners. Apart from the historic context, however, he shows the viewers the everyday reality of life in the so-called grey zone, the strip of land directly touching the frontlines. The documentary permits us to view the military conflict from the perspective of the locals and witness the everyday situations experienced by the locals in the unstable region. Through Nazar, the viewer gets a chance to learn about the everyday lives of four different people – a small school girl, a humanitarian aid worker, a female doctor and a senior citizen. In the state of war, their everyday rituals often become absurd.

Comfortable Century

Presenting history of the 20th century, Comfortable century is a narrative from the point of view of a unique set of Pilsner interiors. Designed by Adolf Loos, these flats witnessed both ordinary episodes from their residents‘ private lives and significant milestones of our modern history, having had impact on Adolf Loos himself as well as on global architecture development. The film uses current language inspired by the documentary tradition, connecting it with visual art procedures to create a compact aggregate of our history. Using video mapping technique, freshly recalled memories from temporary shots are getting back to their original places, installing in the flats and openings here and there.
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