Forest Walkers

This second feature (after The Way Through the Bleak Woods) by the experienced Czech documentary maker Ivan Vojnár, is a philosophical parable that moves between fiction and document. The film was inspired by an idea by Martin Rysavy about the lives of two people who lead a roaming existence. After some time, the director and scriptwriter however started to drift apart: Rysavy wrote a book, Vojnár made the film.While shooting his films, Vojnár made widespread use of improvisation and leant on the couleur locale and on the contribution of actors and crew. Forest Walkers follows the adventures of two generations and two families, from the 1960s to the 1990s. Vojnár leaves historic fact alone and concentrates on the intrinsic mood of the story. His film is about the question of how children have to cope with the ideas of their parents while also realising their own dreams. In Forest Walkers, personal events and ideas acquire a universal meaning: the film often looks less like a story than a series of monologues and dialogues about human potential and responsibilities at a certain time and in a certain place: former Czechoslovakia.Vojnár shot his film in the landscape around Usti nad Labem, where he used (well known) actors from the local theatre world. The beautiful colour photography is flattering to the modern industrial areas.