Welcome in Zlín! The 63rd Zlín Film Festival is starting...

The 63rd Zlín Film Festival will bring 295 films from 50 countries and a rich supporting program for schools and the whole family. As of today, it is welcoming important personalities from the film industry who are heading to Zlín. Actor Pavel Nový will be awarded a Golden Slipper in the evening.

This year, the Zlín Film Festival is starting on Children's Day and is primarily intended for children and young people.

"We are expecting a beautiful week together with our festival audience and our guests in the beautiful environment of Zlín in spring. "Children and adolescents are both demanding and fun-loving audiences. We look forward to them and to our guests together with our partners and sponsors, and I believe that Zlín will again be good hosts and neighbors this year”, said the President of the Zlín Film Festival Čestmír Vančura, adding that the film and supporting program is, of course, not only aimed at young audiences, but also at other age categories and, first and foremost, families.

With its content, the festival also focuses on school groups. "Due to the great interest from local and non-Zlín schools, we have added a further screening site in Zlín this year, which is the TBU auditorium on Mostní Street. The capacity of the morning screenings is currently 85% full, and so is the case with the morning film workshops,” said Jarmila Záhorová, Executive Director of ZFF, assessing the situation and adding: "Compared to last year, the number of schools outside Zlín preparing one-day school trips to the festival has also slightly increased. This year, 38 of them will be heading to us. The furthest being, for example, from Litomyšl and Čáslav.”

The number of accredited guests going to Zlín reached 2,214 before the start of the festival. The capacity of all the accommodation facilities in the city that we have reserved for our needs is currently completely exhausted. And so are the remaining spare capacities in Zlín and the surrounding area,” said Jarmila Záhorová, Executive Director of the festival.

In its film program, the 63rd Zlín Film Festival is offering a total of 295 films from 50 countries around the world. 

As is true every year, there will be no shortage of traditional European countries such as Germany, Finland, and France. "However, exotic locals such as Peru, Qatar and Nicaragua are also represented," added the artistic director Markéta Pášmová and confirmed that it will be a year with an unprecedentedly strong participation of Canadian and Norwegian films, which is also reflected in the composition of the main competitions.

The morning opening film of the festival will be the feature-length animated film Tony, Shelly and Magic Light, which was created in a Czech-Slovak-Hungarian co-production. The world premiere will take place in Zlín on Thursday, June 1, at 10:00 a.m.

One of the animated characters of this film was also voiced by the actor Pavel Nový, to whom the President of the Festival will award the Golden Slipper Award for Lifetime Achievement in Cinematography for Children and Youth on the same evening. “I feel honoured, therefore it is my pleasure,” responded Pavel Nový to news of the award, adding that he had definitely not finished working for children: “After all, I should be making another children's film this summer, in which I will initially be a mysterious character.“ A second Golden Slipper will be received by actress Zlata Adamovská at the end of the festival.

As part of the evening opening, audiences can look forward to the Canadian film Billie Blue at 7 pm.This summer story of romantic first love will be presented by director Mariloup Wolfe, author and screenwriter Sarah-Maude Beauchesne, and the main actress Lilliane Skelly.