At the upcoming 31st edition of the Košice-based IFF Art Film, taking place from June 20 to 27, 2025, a variety of classic and contemporary Slovak films will be screened. Ten titles from the collections of the Slovak Film Institute (SFI) will be presented, seven films will compete in the festival’s competition sections, and an additional eleven films will be shown in non-competitive programs.
Section SFI: Our Family Film Treasures will present ten archival films at Košice’s Úsmev cinema, with exactly half of them being short films. The short film block titled Shorts from Eastern Slovakia will open with a video introduction by Rudolf Urc, who also curated the section. The selection features rarely screened works that portray Eastern Slovakia through the lens of documentary filmmakers, including: The Train Engine (dir. Karol Skřipský), Marked by Darkness (dir. Štefan Uher), The house of Batromij (dir. Fero Fenič), Interview (dir. Otakar Krivánek), and Cursed Valley (dir. Štefan Kamenický).
From the extensive archive of feature films, audiences will also see three titles in this program section: two dramedies When the Stars Were Red (dir. Dušan Trančík, 1990) and I Love, You Love (dir. Dušan Hanák, 1980) and the psychological drama Before Tonight Is Over (dir. Peter Solan, 1965). Under the Milan Lasica Award section, which honors actor Ivan Mistrík, two early-career Slovak comedies will be screened: Luck Will Come on Sunday (dir. Ján Lacko, 1958) and The Archimedean Principle (dir. Andrej Lettrich, 1964).
In the International Competition of Feature Films, Slovakia will be represented by Perla, a feature film directed by Alexandra Makarová. This Austrian-Slovak co-production had its world premiere in the prestigious Tiger Competition at the International Film Festival Rotterdam.
In the International Competition of Short Films, four Slovak films will vie for the Blue Angel for the best short film among 36 contenders. Three of them were produced by the Academy of Performing Arts: Venus in Retrograde (dir. Štefánia Lovasová), Hot Flush (dir. Hana Hančinová), and Confession (dir. Rebeka Bizubová), which won the national Sun in a Net Award for Best Short Fiction or Documentary Film. Rounding out the selection is the Czech-Slovak-Ukrainian co-production I Died in Irpin (dir. Anastasiia Falileieva), which received the Award for Best Animation at the prestigious Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival.
In the third competitive section, International Competition of Central and Eastern European Films, two of the eight selected films are Slovak documentaries. The world premiere of the Slovak-Czech-French docudrama OPERATION MONACO (dir. Dušan Trančík) will be held at the festival, alongside Chronicle (dir. Martin Kollár), a Slovak-Czech essayistic documentary that had its world premiere at the renowned Swiss festival Visions du Réel.
In the non-competitive section Slovak Season, which showcases domestic productions in Slovak premieres, five films will be featured. From the documentary selection, Košice will host the screening of the mid-length film Varso (dir. Kristián Grupač), capturing the life and work of the quirky musician Peter Varsavík and I’m Not a Bad Man (dir. Nadya Todorova), which follows the confrontation between a former Warsaw Pact soldier returning to Prague 55 years after the 1968 invasion and a man who protested against it. The fiction lineup includes two comedies: a loose adaptation of Timrava’s novella Sluggard Clan (dir. Rastislav Boroš) and the satirical mockumentary SCHEEP TOO (dir. Peter Pavlík). The section closes with the biopic Shadow of Victory (dir. Bård Breien), chronicling the life of Norwegian light heavyweight boxing champion Magne Havnaa.
In the Slovak Season Special subsection, two films will be presented that, although not produced by Slovak companies, were made on Slovak territory: the German-produced biopic Goebbels (dir. Joachim A. Lang) and the documentary Joe the First (dir. Marek Vaňous, Branko Cap, Radoslav Štefanov).
The Movies for Kids section, tailored for the festival’s youngest visitors, will feature the Czech-Slovak co-production Sugar Candy (dir. Pavel Jandourek), which recently had its world premiere at the Zlín Film Festival.
The Golden Camera award, which honors film professionals, will this year be presented to one of Slovakia’s most prominent and active cinematographers — Martin Štrba. To mark the occasion, two films from different stages of his career will be screened: The Garden (1995, dir. Martin Šulík) from his early period and The Hungarian Dressmaker (dir. Iveta Grófová, 2024), one of his latest works.
This year’s Actor’s Mission award will go to Daniela Kolářová and Milan Ondrík. The talent of Slovak actor Milan Ondrík will be showcased at the festival through the screening of Let There Be Light (dir. Marko Škop), concluding the Slovak lineup at Art Film Fest 2025.
