The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (KVIFF) celebrates a double anniversary this year, thanks to its 60th edition in its 80th year. It will, as always, celebrate world premieres from around the world, new hidden gems waiting to be discovered, and highlights from the recent festival circuit.
But Central Europe’s biggest film festival, which takes place from July 3 to 11, will also once again screen offbeat, exciting, and sometimes even bizarre, films.
So, sit back, get comfortable and buckle up for a road trip THR Offers her look at some of the more bizarre and unusual films that KVIFF will unveil during its 2026 edition.
Black money for white nights (Cherni pari za beli noshti)
Directors: Kristina Grozeva, Petar Valchanov
Section: Crystal Globe Competition
The Bulgarian director duo won the 2019 KVIFF Best Film Award for their film father (Bashtata). In the anniversary edition, they will be shown for the first time in the world Black money for white nightsWhich they wrote with Decho Taralizkov.
Tanya Shahova, Ivan Savov, Margita Gosheva, Ivan Barnev, and Sibyla Petrova star in the tragic portrait of a generation forced to reevaluate its values because it must question everything in post-Soviet society.
“After years of saving money from the small bribes they collect, 60-year-old Marina and her husband Gosha from Bulgaria prepare for their dream trip to St. Petersburg to witness the White Nights,” a natural phenomenon in which the sun never dips low enough below the horizon to cause complete darkness, reads the film’s synopsis. “But when Russia invades Ukraine, and the travel agency disappears with all its savings, the couple’s dream collapses along with the illusion of control over their moral principles and their relationship.”
My friend is a porn star (Mein Freund der Burstar)
Director: Rosa Friedrich
Section: Proxima
Check out this documentary, or the synopsis: “Rosa – director Rosa Friedrich herself – was never interested in porn, until her boyfriend Timo expressed an interest in starring in an erotic film. So Rosa agreed to help him get his project off the ground.”
Not interested yet? Read this! “However, the closer the filming date gets, the more embarrassed and doubtful Timo feels about getting involved in the first place. His face is eventually replaced with the help of artificial intelligence, and Rosa continues in the film, along with a dominatrix, three trans women, a food porn creator, a sex coach and other protagonists.”
If you’re not sold yet, let’s just mention that among the people featured in the movie, for which New Docs is handling sales, there’s also someone named Alice Moe, better known as Eric Big Clit. Porn certainly looks like it’s going to get a new face and look, thanks to the debut of Friedrich.
City of fathers (This is not the case)
Director: Zdenek Tek
Section: Special Offers
In his first feature film since 2013 Never neverThe Czech director returns to hear his distinctive voice once again and explores existential themes led by Tomáš Vravnik and Vladimir Javorski.
His new film tells the story of a father and son who, according to the synopsis, “have nothing in common except a first name, Richard, and an apartment on a housing estate.” How many odd couples? Well, the son is a good-natured factory worker in his 30s who listens to heavy metal music. His father is a frail retired teacher who raised the boy after his mother’s departure and is “the embodiment of care and understanding.”
Are you wondering what could trigger an exotic journey from here? The KVIFF website shares this much: “Their quiet, shared reality, which includes both the hardcore band Našrot and [Ingmar] Bergman Screams and whispersis disrupted by the sudden death of the mother.”
Ink-stained hand and missing thumb
Director: Yashavi Goyal
Section: Proxima
The title alone will likely turn heads for this film, which looks a bit like an indie film Waiting for Godot From director Yashasvi Goyal, who co-wrote the script with Ankit Thapa.
“If the world had an edge, it might look like the remote corner of northern India where Santosh and Raji live, collecting highway tolls in ramshackle kiosks,” according to a plot synopsis on the KVIFF website. “Endless work and waiting are blurred together.”
But we should all expect some drama to occur. After all, the festival warns: “Bound by the power of love, but also by the need to constantly move in search of work, they dream of the happiness that awaits them in a new place…until one day, a sudden tragedy turns their lives upside down.”
Gregory the Chosen One (Vivolini)
Director: Thomas Melnyk
Section: Special Offers
Polish writer-director Melnyk brings a taste of papal cinema to Karlovy Vary with the follow-up to his 2015 feature debut Trip to Rome. The Czech festival promises “wild, silly comedy.”
The film is based and inspired by one of the writer’s last novels Magic mountain and Death in Venice author Thomas Mann, Holy sinner. The young Gregory was portrayed by Jan František O’Hare (Winter flies) as he wanders the legendary lands on a journey through different adventures.
You may want to sit down and take a deep breath before you read the summary. Here he says: “‘Puppeteer, tell us a story we don’t know yet!’” The audience calls out to a wandering puppeteer. And so he begins to tell a story about a boy born of the forbidden love between a brother and a sister, who had many adventures, who spent 17 years chained to a rock, and who might as well have been… a hedgehog? But that’s not as important as how, after overcoming all these obstacles, he ended up becoming the Pope.
Chica chica
Director: Simon Holly
Section: Crystal Globe Competition
Two of his low budget films are Mirrors in the dark and And then there was love… It was shown in Karlovy Vary. This year, Holý returns to international co-production Chica chica.
The heroine, played by Pavla Tomikova, is the widowed village postman Zdina, who is trying to fulfill the last wish of her sick mother. Zdena copes with her loneliness by eating cucumbers and watching TV
But a series of unexpected events brings her closer to her son, played by Jean Cena, who lives in France. As the events of the film unfold, a longing for a different life awakens in her. The only question left now is who or what will become Chika Chika?! We’ll have to watch the movie to find out.
