On 4 July, KVIFF marks the centenary of the birth of legendary Czechoslovak director and screenwriter Oldřich Lipský with pithy highlanders and the “Dance of the Blessed Spirits” from Orfeo ed Euridice – which, of course, you’ll find in The Mystery of the Carpathian Castle. Written by Lipský and the equally famous Jiří Brdečka, their perhaps greatest collaboration updates Jules Verne’s The Carpathian Castle with unique parodic elements. In search of his missing fiancée, the opera singer Salsa Verde, Count Felix Teleke of Tölökö is led to the mysterious ruins of a nearby castle. In its time a healing tonic in the face of the gray reality of Normalization-era Czechoslovakia, the film is today considered one of the greatest gems of domestic art. Away to Chort Castle!