Jan Šípek

A prominent Czech journalist Saša Uhlová leaves her family and joins “cheap labour force” in Western Europe. Undercover, she works at an asparagus farm in Germany, tries her hand as a maid at a hotel in Ireland and takes care of the elderly in France. She experiences first-hand the struggles of Eastern European low-wage workers whose sacrifice and hard work allow for the Western society’s comfort. What is the real price that Europe pays for exploiting its own citizens? How do the lives of economic migrants, who have been forced to leave their children and elderly parents, look like? And why are privileged Europeans looking the other way?

The film takes place on the eighth day of Russia's war campaign in Ukraine. Eight Ukrainians residing in the Czech Republic – a businesswoman, cleaning ladies, construction workers, and bus drivers – make their own diary-like observations of the events in their homeland. They continue to bury themselves in their work, unable to afford to withdraw themselves from their current lives. In their minds, however, they've transported themselves hundreds of kilometers away, helping their fellow countrymen and women by any means necessary. They provide accommodation for refugees, scout for bulletproof vests, and call their loved ones who’ve taken shelter from falling bombs. They have a hectic and emotionally overwhelming 24 hours ahead of them. But it’s not the first 24 hours and it won’t be the last.

Working conditions in the worst-paid jobs in the Czech Republic were examined by journalist Saša Uhlová during six months. She spent several weeks in a hospital laundrette, poultry house, cash register or waste sorting facility. Her experience became the basis of a lived and very personal report of invisible employees working in appalling conditions. Uhlová wrote a series of reports on her project that were published on the Alarm website. Apolena Rychlíková made them into a documentary film consisting of scenes shot at Uhlová's home and video footage taken during her work. Uhlová accompanies the picture with read commentary.

A meditative film explores the effects that examining consciousness and a microscopic view of one’s inner self have on the rationalism that scientists are expected to have. Even though each has a different approach, a physicist and an economist have similar, indescribable experiences, which they can only show through ‘reflections’. Efforts to change a flat map into an actual landscape lead to an unaffected re-examination of the foundations of our society, in which the myth of objectivity often covers up the manipulation of the powers-that-be, and the desire for deeper knowledge may be the driving force for the military industrial complex just as much as for getting a degree.

A meditative film explores the effects that examining consciousness and a microscopic view of one’s inner self have on the rationalism that scientists are expected to have. Even though each has a different approach, a physicist and an economist have similar, indescribable experiences, which they can only show through ‘reflections’. Efforts to change a flat map into an actual landscape lead to an unaffected re-examination of the foundations of our society, in which the myth of objectivity often covers up the manipulation of the powers-that-be, and the desire for deeper knowledge may be the driving force for the military industrial complex just as much as for getting a degree.

A meditative film explores the effects that examining consciousness and a microscopic view of one’s inner self have on the rationalism that scientists are expected to have. Even though each has a different approach, a physicist and an economist have similar, indescribable experiences, which they can only show through ‘reflections’. Efforts to change a flat map into an actual landscape lead to an unaffected re-examination of the foundations of our society, in which the myth of objectivity often covers up the manipulation of the powers-that-be, and the desire for deeper knowledge may be the driving force for the military industrial complex just as much as for getting a degree.

A meditative film explores the effects that examining consciousness and a microscopic view of one’s inner self have on the rationalism that scientists are expected to have. Even though each has a different approach, a physicist and an economist have similar, indescribable experiences, which they can only show through ‘reflections’. Efforts to change a flat map into an actual landscape lead to an unaffected re-examination of the foundations of our society, in which the myth of objectivity often covers up the manipulation of the powers-that-be, and the desire for deeper knowledge may be the driving force for the military industrial complex just as much as for getting a degree.

A threefold portrait, presenting the reality within the limits of a subjective view, puts together the lives of an increasingly more remote writer and musician; a hacker, dreaming his dream of transformation into a purely virtual existence in the depths of technology; and an undertaker, unrealistic raconteur, living on the history of half-mythical Sudetenland.

A threefold portrait, presenting the reality within the limits of a subjective view, puts together the lives of an increasingly more remote writer and musician; a hacker, dreaming his dream of transformation into a purely virtual existence in the depths of technology; and an undertaker, unrealistic raconteur, living on the history of half-mythical Sudetenland.

A threefold portrait, presenting the reality within the limits of a subjective view, puts together the lives of an increasingly more remote writer and musician; a hacker, dreaming his dream of transformation into a purely virtual existence in the depths of technology; and an undertaker, unrealistic raconteur, living on the history of half-mythical Sudetenland.

A threefold portrait, presenting the reality within the limits of a subjective view, puts together the lives of an increasingly more remote writer and musician; a hacker, dreaming his dream of transformation into a purely virtual existence in the depths of technology; and an undertaker, unrealistic raconteur, living on the history of half-mythical Sudetenland.

A threefold portrait, presenting the reality within the limits of a subjective view, puts together the lives of an increasingly more remote writer and musician; a hacker, dreaming his dream of transformation into a purely virtual existence in the depths of technology; and an undertaker, unrealistic raconteur, living on the history of half-mythical Sudetenland.

A film poem. A minimalist reflection on whether inner states are transferable by the film medium. The aim of a Buddhist mindfulness meditation is to clear away thoughts wandering from the past to the present, to be mindfully aware of each present moment. Each unique NOW NOW NOW passing away just like single frames while the camera grab snatches off meters of expensive 35mm material.