With Kisses from Your Love
The private film archives of a family of photographers provide a look back at the 1940s and 1950s in With Kisses from Your Love.
Josef and Marie Slechtl met at grammar school in Tabor. Josef was the son of a renowned photographer. He allowed Marie access to his family's photography studio, and the medium soon became a part of her life as well. Photography bonded them, and the pair's loving relationship can be felt even in the first shots they took together.
During the second half of 1940s, Josef and Marie inherited the studio from Josef's father. They rebuilt and ran it successfully, including caring for its large photo archive and entertaining President Benes, who had a villa in nearby Sezimovo Ústí. The young couple felt that they held the world in their lucky hands.
In the initial years following the Communist coup, Josef and Maria's relationship was stronger than the politically-charged milieu in which they lived. They lived an apolitical life. But history caught up with them. First, the studio was nationalized and, later, with a show-trial against Josef, due to the Party's expectation that compromising materials existed in the family photo-archive.
The Slechtl's story is accompanied by affectionate letters the imprisoned Josef sent to Marie from jail. Even in prison, they showed their defiance to the absurd era in which they were forced to live.
Script, Direction: Jan Šikl
Editor: Jan Daňhel
Sound engineer: Daniel Němec
Script editor: Jan Gogola ml.
Duration: 52 min
