Agnieszka Holland’s Franz Kafka biopic “Franz,” which will have its world premiere in Toronto Film Festival’s Special Presentation section, has debuted its trailer.
In an exclusive interview with Variety, Holland, the director of Oscar nominated films like “Angry Harvest,” “Europa Europa” and “In Darkness,” explained how the film took shape, and her take on Kafka, best known for “The Metamorphosis,” “The Trial” and “The Castle.” Read the interview here.
German actor Idan Weiss plays Kafka, Czech actor Jenovéfa Boková is Milena Jesenská, German actor Peter Kurth (“Babylon Berlin”) portrays the author’s father Hermann, Poland’s Sandra Korzeniak takes the role of his mother, Czech thespian Ivan Trojan is his uncle, and Czech actor Josef Trojan plays Kafka’s alter ego.
The screenplay was written by Marek Epstein (one of the screenwriters on Holland’s “Charlatan”) in collaboration with Holland; cinematography is by Tomasz Naumiuk, who was DOP on Holland’s “Mr. Jones” and “Green Border.”
Films Boutique is handling world sales on the film (see here for Variety’s exclusive story on first sales).
The film is produced by Šárka Cimbalová of Czech company Marlene Film Production. It is an international co-production with Germany’s X Filme Creative Pool (Uwe Schott, Jorgo Narjes) and Poland’s Metro Films (Marcin Wierzchosławski, Alicja Jagodzińska).
Co-producers also include Barrandov Studio, Telewizja Polska, Czech Television, the Polish Film Institute, Canal+, Czech Anglo Production and NeoSynCon.
The executive producers are Mike Downey, Kevan van Thompson, Daniel Bergmann, Jeff Field and Emir Külal Haznevi.
The film received co-production support from David Grumbach and Alexis Hofmann of Bac Films and the Republic of Türkiye Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
The film was supported by the Czech Audiovisual Fund, Eurimages, the Prague Audiovisual Foundation, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, ZDF/ARTE, DFFF and the film offices of the Pilsen and Ústí nad Labem regions. ČPP and Bluetech are partners of the film.
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