Directed by: Agnieszka Holland
Starring: Idan Weiss, Jenovéfa Boková, Carol Schuler, Sandra Korzeniak
Rating: ★★★★☆
Agnieszka Holland fell under the spell of the Czechoslovak New Wave. The Polish cineaste studied directing at Prague’s prestigious FAMU and simultaneously shaped her political conscience as a dissident in support of the Prague Spring in 1968. Franz marks her third collaboration with Czech producer Šárka Cimbalová of Marlene Film Production, following Charlatan (2020) and Green Border (2023). This continuity further confirms the strength of their creative partnership.
Holland does not simply insert estranging or gimmicky contemporary flourishes as Sofia Coppola did in Marie Antoinette (2006). Instead, she constructs a film in which past and present continually intermingle without collapsing into each other. Franz probes key elements of Kafka’s life while also confronting the cultural legacy of the Czech writer and his resonance today.
The visionary misunderstood by his contemporaries, the nascent rebellion against an oppressive father, these familiar themes surface again, at times through literalized visions. Yet the film never becomes literary or mannered in tone. Holland even stages the torture machine Kafka described In the Penal Colony, the apparatus that engraves a prisoner’s sentence onto his skin as it slowly kills him, transforming the writer’s nightmare into corporeal reality.
Portraying Kafka without unsettling the audience is almost impossible. Idan Weiss offers a dazzling and disarmingly sincere performance. It is difficult to think that the big screen will ever welcome a more definitive Kafka than the one the German thesp gives us. The sharp screenplay, co-written by Marek Epstein, exposes the ongoing commercial myth-making surrounding Kafka. After the Kafka burgers, what else might the tourism industry invent?
Fortunately, Holland’s Brechtian approach, including direct addresses to the camera, enhances the distancing effect rather than diluting it. Overall her long-standing “Czech connection” remains as vital and rewarding as ever. Franz ultimately succeeds as a “detoxifying” biopic, one that enlightens without ever drifting into lecturing.
Film Reviewed by Giuseppe Sedia
Published by Kino Mania on December 23, 2025