Fair Play

Andrea Sedláčková's drama about a talented sprinter who is included in a state-controlled doping programme in 1980s Czechoslovakia has been nominated for 15 Czech Lions.

Fair Play
Czechia 2014
100 min.
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Czechoslovakia, the gray 1980s. Teenage Anna is a top sprinter and her trainer thinks she can go all the way to the Olympics. Her mother is also pinning her hopes on Anna’s success, seeing it as an opportunity for her daughter to live in the free world beyond the Iron Curtain. This vision is so strong that she willingly supports the doping program the communist regime is testing on her daughter – although her health will clearly suffer. Unfolding gradually, Fair Play may be a tale of fiction but it shines a light on historically-based demands made by the regime, and when they concerned a loved one it was difficult to ignore them. In addition to her powerful, unromanticized evocation of the era that avoids becoming an ostentatious stream of period props, the director succeeds in putting forward a universal story of adolescent fragility without resorting to melodrama. Although ostensibly about sports, this film presents a depiction of relationships and their complications.

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Credits
Director: Andrea Sedláčková
Screenplay: Andrea Sedláčková
Cinematography: Jan Baset Střítežský
Music: David Solař, Miro Žbirka
Sound: Daniel Němec, Johannes Doberenz
Editing: Jakub Hejna
Production Design: Petr Fořt, Viera Dandová
Producer: Kateřina Černá, Pavel Strnad
Costumes: Simona Rybáková
Cast: Judit Pecháček, Aňa Geislerová, Roman Luknár, Eva Podzimková, Ondřej Novák, Roman Zach, Igor Bareš, Jiří Wohanka, Ondřej Malý, Taťjana Medvecká
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