Czech documentary film about xenophobia, "Czechs versus Czechs", wins special honor at Jihlava film festival

Tomáš Kratochvíl’s documentary film "Czechs versus Czechs" (Češi proti Čechům) has won special recognition at the documentary film festival in Jihlava "for the impressive use of film as a personal journal to break down social prejudices and stereotypes". The director made the film in the Romani ghetto of Předlice, where he lived for eight months.

The film is a continuation of his previous documentary, "Gadžo". The website of the Jihlava festival presents the following dialogue as an annotation to the film:

"I’d throw a grenade at them."

"Who?"

"The gypsies. They multiply like mice."

"Do they have to be killed?"

"Yes. Do you know what Hitler should have done? Left the Jews alone and shot the gypsies. There are too many of them."

The jury this year at Jihlava did not award a prize for the best Czech documentary. It instead awarded two special recognitions, one for "Czechs versus Czechs" and one for "Steel Tears, or, Vladimír Stehlík’s Search for Lubomír Krystlík" (Ocelové slzy aneb Cesta Vladimíra Stehlíka za Lubomírem Krystlíkem).