Amplified Silence

A story about a girl, a foreign worker employed at a printing house. A boy and several men long for the girl, but they do not meet even the girl’s low demands. Her current boyfriend (and superior) is cheating on her, her new admirer at work is currently homeless, and the third man is probably a liar.

Adam had his life ahead of him; all that was left was to finish his exams and apply to university. To fight off boredom and to feel relaxed and funny, he turned to alcohol. Then came the trouble. Now at a rehabilitation centre for alcoholics, he initially defies the strict regime here. His views of the treatment and himself change only thanks to an empathetic therapist. The inhospitable environment becomes a place of self-reflection on an event that irreversibly changed Adam's life.

Even though doctors Ondřej and Kateřina look after their patients to the best of their ability, they can’t prevent their death. As heads of palliative care at Prague’s General University Hospital they face the inevitability of the end on a daily basis. Yet what perhaps makes their job harder is the myriad options now open to them to prolong human life – and this at a time when death has become a social taboo. Betraying her special brand of empathy, documentarist Adéla Komrzý demonstrates that, while there’s no good or bad way to die, there’s always a means to improve patients’ quality of life.

Based on first-person interviews and archival materials, this animated documentary brings back the glory days of Czechoslovak hockey — but also the dark moments from the year 1950. Chase follows not only the players’ personal fates, but also the transformations in society, politics, and culture taking place in the background.

Šimon (46) has been suffering from insomnia for several years. Behind the illusion of a secure and happy life, he has a monotonous job he doesn't like, his wife looks down on him, his son doesn’t take him seriously, and Šimon has long since lost any hope for change. But then he discovers a 16-year-old YouTuber on his son’s computer whose ASMR videos finally help him to sleep. But he soon realises that the girl means much more to him than he had thought. The illusion begins to crumble.