Cinema
Distant Journey
Daleká cesta
Alfréd Radok · 1949
Synopsis
Prague, under the occupation. Hana Kaufmannová, a young Jewish ophthalmologist, is dismissed from her clinic because of her origins. She marries her colleague Antonín Bureš, who is not Jewish, and this mixed marriage delays her own deportation, while her parents leave with the first convoys for the Terezín ghetto. The family's story is constantly interrupted by newsreel images, parades and speeches by Nazi dignitaries.
Context
Three years after the death of many of his relatives, the director prepared the screenplay with Mojmír Drvota in the spring of 1948, a few weeks after the Communist seizure of power; it was his first film on his own. The exteriors were shot in Terezín itself, and a large part of the archive footage comes from Triumph of the Will. Approved in May 1949 despite the changes, the film received a frosty reception from the authorities: it was shown only in the suburbs and in the provinces, before being withdrawn from distribution.
Who it is for
One hundred and eight minutes, in Czech and German; fiction and archive documents alternate throughout the film.
Prizes and reception
Ranked by the New York Times among the ten best films of 1950; one of the first fiction films about the Shoah.