When: November 29, 2025, at 4:00 p.m.

Where: Ottawa Art Gallery (OAG) – Alma Duncan Salon, 10 Daly Ave, Level 3

“Everything you love is very likely to be lost but in the end love will return in a different way“ – Franz Kafka

Director Agnieszka Holland brings Kafka’s complex and fragile personality to the screen with remarkable sensitivity. Instead of a conventional biopic, she creates a sensually rich and emotionally layered portrait in which reality, fantasy, and literary symbolism intertwine. Franz is not only a film about a writer, but also a film about writing itself — about the struggle between creativity and fear, and the constant effort to understand oneself and a world that defies reason.

The story follows Kafka’s life from his childhood in late 19th-century Prague to his final days after World War I. We see Franz as a son who could never escape his father’s shadow, as a clerk suffocated by bureaucratic absurdity, and as a lover capable of loving only through letters.
In the title role, Idan Wiess embodies Kafka with both tenderness and intensity, revealing his humor, imagination, and deep existential anxiety. Alongside him, Jenovéfa Boková and Ivan Trojan bring a moving human dimension to the story.

We warmly invite you to a screening of Franz as part of a diverse lineup of European films at this year’s European Union Film Festival (EUFF).

Saturday, November 29, 2025, at 4:00 PM

Ottawa Art Gallery (OAG) – Alma Duncan Salon, 10 Daly Ave, Level 3

The European Union Film Festival (EUFF) is made possible through the collaboration of the Delegation of the European Union to Canada, the Canadian Film Institute, the EU Film Festival in Toronto, Cinematheque in Vancouver, and the embassies and consulates of EU member states in Canada.

Audiences can look forward to a vibrant selection of European cinema — from dramas and romantic comedies to thought-provoking documentaries. All films are screened in their original languages with English (or French) subtitles.

For full festival information, please visit the official CFI website:
https://www.cfi-icf.ca/euff25

Tickets for the Czech film Franz (Ottawa screening) are available here:
https://euff2025.eventive.org/schedule/68e98faaee8231366b26883f