“After Party”, interview with director Vojtĕch Strakatý

At the 81th Venice Film Festival, Fred Film Radio interviewed Vojtĕch Strakatý, director of “After Party” featured at Orizzonti Extra.

A semi-autobiographical film

“After Party” is inspired by the director’s own life and a difficult time for his family. Was choosing to tell this story also a way of freeing yourself from those past emotions? “The idea for the film started among, or amidst the bad things happening to our family. It was in debts because of my father’s actions and even though it was really sad and depressing and really tough to go through it, I was always thinking that if I wanted to be a filmmaker it’s always easier and better to draw from my own life because the closer the subject to you, the more authentic or the more true the film will turn out”, says Vojtĕch Strakatý. “But I never wanted to approach it as an autobiography. I wanted to just take elements that happened in real life to me and create this one day of my heroine but all of these were made up, but just filled with details of my own life that I’ve been through that I knew well. And because in real life things are so complicated that it would never translate well in film, it would be too complicated for the viewers, so you have to make it differently. I wanted to make this film inspired by my life, I’ve never thought of it as a therapeutic way or just going through it. I’ve never lived through it again during the filming process”.

Capture the moment

The action takes place over 24 hours, but “After Party” also talks a lot about the past and future of the protagonist and her family. “Also in real life things usually happen very slow, like over days, weeks, months, years. And also in our case of our family it was like years or decades. But in cinema I’m always fascinated by the now, by the real time element of film that you’re capturing. I thought even in real life some days are more crucial to you, and I thought it would be interesting to condensate this story that spans more years into one day that will be just very decisive for Jędziszka. In terms of time there are things that happen before the film starts, and there are things that will happen after it ends, but I sort of thought that this specific day in her life is transformative, that it’s sort of a threshold for her in terms of becoming more adult in a way”.

The choice to use a non-dramatic tone

Even if the world of the main character falls apart, Vojtĕch Strakatý decided to maintain a tone not so dramatic in “After Party”. A choice that is also reflected in the desire to use a lot of light during filming. “I think it’s important to offer light and hope, especially in the current state of the world, so that’s what I’m, even as a viewer, that’s what I look in when I’m watching films. I don’t want to watch things that are too nihilistic. I think there’s a lot of it in the world, and I think cinema can offer us at least a spark of hope, or a spark of lightness. And for me it was always a film that should have this summer vibe, coming of age movie elements that were contrasted with the family drama. Because I’ve seen many family dramas, and they are usually heavy and depressing. I didn’t want the audience and myself included to be only depressed. So I thought: ‘Let’s just try to balance these two energies'”.

Plot