Introducing the feature-length documentaries nominated for the Pavel Koutecký Award 2026

The feature-length category of the 20th anniversary edition of the Pavel Koutecký Award presents five documentaries by filmmakers that were their first or second feature-length films. The nominated films show remarkable thematic and formal diversity and demonstrate the various ways in which contemporary documentary film can be approached.

The film Is It Worth It!? by director Jan Strejcovský takes a satirical look behind the scenes of the art market and explores the tension between the value of an artwork and its market price. The film Unborn Father by director Michal Böhm is an intimate and uncompromisingly honest autobiographical confession about fear, fragility, doubts, but also courage in the face of questions about starting a family. In the film Resilience, director Tomáš Elšík combines an environmental documentary with the rhythm of a crime thriller and, set against the backdrop of a search for a bird poisoner, raises urgent questions about our relationship to the world we live in. Satan Kingdom Babylon by the creative duo Marie Šprincl and Petr Šprincl takes the viewer into the world of conspiracy-driven hate movements in contemporary America and, through a combination of video game graphics and footage from old digital cameras, gradually blurs the boundaries between reality, dream, and fiction. And the film Urban Disobedience Toolkit by director Vladimír Turner, draws attention to the growing gentrification of Prague and gives a voice to activists who are fighting for public space by various (and often illegal) means.

The competing films will be screened from February 9 to 10 at Kino Kavalírka.