Ungrateful Beings

by Olmo Omerzu

Nehvaležna bitja, orig. Ungrateful Beings, 2025, fiction, co-production, 1,85:1, c, 110 min
Finished

CZ, SI, PL, SK, HR, FR

David takes his two children on holiday to the Adriatic Sea, hoping to hold their fractured bilingual family together. His 17-year-old daughter, Klára, struggling with an eating disorder, falls in love with a local boy, Denis. When he is accused of murder, David rushes the children back home. Klára’s condition spirals, landing her in hospital. The only thing uniting her parents is their need to save her. And desperate times call for desperate measures.

screenwriters
Olmo Omerzu, Nebojša Pop Tasić, Kasha Jandáčková
script consultants
Răzvan Rădulescu, Miro Šifra
director
Olmo Omerzu
producer
Jiří Konečný
co-producers
Rok Biček, Mariusz Włodarski, Marta Gmosińska, Michal Sikora, Jaroslav Sedláček, Ivan Ostrochovský, Hélène Mitjavile
director of photography
Kryštof Melka
music composer
Monika Omerzu Midriaková
film editor
Jarosław Kamiński
production designer
Antonín Šílar
costume designer
Zuzana Formánková
key make-up artist
Przemysław Smoliński
sound designer
Michał Fojcik

featuring
Barry Ward, Dexter Franc, Antonín Chmela, Barbora Bobuľová, Timon Šturbej

production
Endorfilm
co-production
Cvinger film, Lava Films, Lonely Production, Czech Television, Punkchart films, Kinorama, Melocoton Films, RTV Slovenija
in collaboration with
Film Studio Viba Film
co-funding
Czech Film Fund, Jihomoravský filmový nadační fond, Polish Film Institute, Slovenian Film Centre, Slovak Audiovisual Fund, Croatian Audiovisual Centre, Aide Aux Cinémas Du Monde - CNC, Plzeňský kraj
distribution
Cercamon

Cvinger film
Rok Biček
rok.bicek@gmail.com

In 2011, Olmo Omerzu (1984) graduated from the FAMU (cz) with his first feature A Night too Young (2012). After the film’s successful premiere in the Forum section of the Berlinale, Omerzu won the Czech Film Critics’ Award for the Discovery of the Year. His second feature Family Film (2015) premiered at the San Sebastian FF and was invited to numerous IFFs, including the Tokyo FF, where it won the Best Artistic Contribution Award. The film also received the awards for Best Film and Best Screenplay at the Czech Film Critics’ Awards. Omezu’s latest feature Winter Flies (2018) was screened at the Toronto FF and won the Best Director Award at the Karlovy Vary IFF.

“Ungrateful Beings is a story of a family in crisis, torn apart by guilt and self-denial. At its core, the film asks: how far are parents willing to go to save their daughter from an eating disorder, even if it means crossing the boundaries between truth and lies, care and manipulation? Through this intimate drama, the film explores how adults unconsciously project their own dysfunctions and unresolved wounds onto their children, unable to face their own failures.”