{"id":536429,"date":"2026-07-06T22:06:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T22:06:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/536429\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T22:06:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T22:06:10","slug":"ivan-ostrochovsky-on-u-s-remake-of-only-beautiful-things-to-look-at","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/536429\/","title":{"rendered":"Ivan Ostrochovsk\u00fd on U.S. Remake of ‘Only Beautiful Things to Look At’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tSlovak director Ivan Ostrochovsk\u00fd is planning a U.S. remake of \u201cOnly Beautiful Things to Look At<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHis latest drama, which premieres at Karlovy Vary Film Festival<\/a>, is set in the 1980s and follows a doctor (A\u0148a Geislerov\u00e1) who begins to question the forced sterilization of Romani women in former Czechoslovakia.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis was happening all around the world,\u201d he tells\u00a0Variety.<\/p>\n

\n\tHis regular collaborator Katar\u00edna Tomkov\u00e1 \u2013 who produced the film alongside Ostrochovsk\u00fd, Albert Malinovsk\u00fd, Pavel Strnad and Petr Oukropec for Punkchart Films and Negativ \u2013 has enrolled in the Global Media Makers Residency with Film Independent, which focuses on the business of filmmaking in the U.S.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe have already conducted research and location scouting on Navajo Nation land in New Mexico, and we\u2019re currently adapting the story to fit the local context. Between the 1970s and 1980s, the birth rate among Native Americans declined by an estimated 60%, and it\u2019s believed that approximately 40% of Native American women were subjected to forced sterilization,\u201d says Ostrochovsk\u00fd.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe feedback we received was that they didn\u2019t want to see another film portraying them as victims, however. They want to meet in the middle and start a dialogue.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBefore that happens, he hopes to start a dialogue in Slovakia too, a country which still has to acknowledge its problematic past and treatment of the Romani community. Forced sterilizations continued well into the 2000s.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cA few years ago, these women started to go to court, but Slovakian government doesn\u2019t want to pay them compensation for these procedures. There has been one official apology \u2013 that\u2019s it. We\u2019re a small country and there aren\u2019t that many films, so chances are people will talk about this one.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tOstrochovsk\u00fd, who co-wrote the film with Marek Le\u0161\u010d\u00e1k, is already behind Slovak Oscar submission \u201cServants.\u201d At Karlovy Vary, he\u2019s also showing new documentary \u201cIgor and After\u201d and \u201c33 Steps,\u201d which he produced.<\/p>\n

\n\tHe reached out to some doctors responsible for the sterilizations.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe spoke with them and they understand why we\u2019re doing this. But many of them really wanted to help [back then], particularly those living in really terrible conditions with seven or eight kids. That\u2019s the main issue here: when you have all these logical, rational arguments, you can forget about what\u2019s moral.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDespite its relatively dark subject matter, \u201cOnly Beautiful Things to Look At\u201d might be his most accessible film yet, featuring star A\u0148a Geislerov\u00e1 in the lead. One of the best known Czech actors, she\u2019s been recently seen in Cannes premiere \u201cCaravan.\u201d\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe wanted to reach the widest audience possible, especially since we knew we were dealing with a difficult subject. We also believed that A\u0148a attracts a different kind of audience to cinemas than those who would typically come to see our films,\u201d he notes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe needed someone who could convincingly portray a character who initially appears cold and rational yet is able to undergo a profound transformation in a believable way without pathos. Also, very few actors can convincingly share the screen with a non-professional actor without overshadowing them. A\u0148a is one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tShe\u2019s joined by Simona Boledovi\u010dov\u00e1, Eva Mores, Vlad Ivanov, \u00c9va Bandor and Attila Mokos.<\/p>\n

\n\tWith the help of cinematographer Juraj Chlp\u00edk, he tried to reflect their characters\u2019 dilemmas in a visually creative way.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was thinking about nature documentaries and all these macro shots of insects or animals. After all, this film is a study of human behavior,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI wanted it to be pleasant to look at \u2013 also because it serves as a metaphor for the so-called \u2018nice life.\u2019 It means different things to different people. To this doctor, it means being comfortable. To someone else, it might mean having lots of children.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tHe adds: \u201cI didn\u2019t want to make another depressing Eastern European movie and scare the viewers away.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Slovak director Ivan Ostrochovsk\u00fd is planning a U.S. remake of \u201cOnly Beautiful Things to Look At.\u201d His latest…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536430,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[227972,93,61,60,227973,208392,270,227974],"class_list":["post-536429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-ana-geislerova","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-ivan-ostrochovsky","tag-karlovy-vary-film-festival","tag-movies","tag-only-beautiful-things-to-look-at"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=536429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536429\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}