The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival announced a prominent lineup of special guests Tuesday morning, including Luxembourgish actress Vicky Krieps, who will also receive the Festival President’s Award at the festival’s opening ceremony. Dakota Johnson and Peter Sarsgaard will also receive a KVIFF Festival President’s Award, and Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgård will be honored with the Crystal Globe for Outstanding Artistic Contribution to World Cinema.
Krieps will be honored in Karlovy Vary with a screening of Love Me Tender (pictured at top), which recently premiered in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes. In the film, based on a memoir by Constance Debré, Krieps plays Clémence, a former lawyer battling for custody of her son after coming out as a lesbian. The role continues Krieps’s commitment to complex characters, and adds to a growing list of challenging performances that have defined her international career.
A career marked by versatility and depth
Krieps first rose to prominence for her breakout role opposite Daniel Day-Lewis in Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2017 drama Phantom Thread, where she played the quietly determined Alma. The role brought her significant critical attention and led to more international opportunities.
She went on to appear in the thriller The Girl in the Spider’s Web (2018), the psychological drama Hold Me Tight (2021), and M. Night Shyamalan’s mystery Old (2021). That same year, she co-starred in Mia Hansen-Løve’s Bergman Island, reinforcing her reputation as an actress who gravitates toward auteur-driven, emotionally layered projects.
Her portrayal of Empress Elisabeth of Austria in Marie Kreutzer’s Corsage (2022) proved to be another defining performance. The film reimagined the myth of “Sisi” with a feminist lens, and Krieps received the Best Actress award in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section, along with the European Film Award for Best Actress. She has continued to take on a mix of historical and contemporary roles, including the title role in Margarethe von Trotta’s Ingeborg Bachmann: Journey into the Desert (2023), which screened at the Berlinale.
Born in Luxembourg, Krieps studied acting in Zurich after early doubts about pursuing a career in the performing arts. Her path took her through theater and television before arriving on the international film circuit. Notably, her recent film The Dead Don’t Hurt (2023), directed by Viggo Mortensen, was screened at last year’s Karlovy Vary festival, where she played Vivienne, a woman navigating survival and moral agency in the American West.
Looking forward, Krieps will appear later this year alongside Cate Blanchett and Adam Driver in Father, Mother, Sister, Brother, the upcoming feature by director Jim Jarmusch. Her evolving body of work reflects a commitment to emotional honesty, narrative risk, and a diversity of roles that cross national and artistic boundaries.
This year’s edition of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, its 59th, will take place from July 4 to 12. It will be the first festival held without longtime president Jiří Bartoška, who passed away last month. A tribute to Bartoška is planned during the festival with the screening of several films.
This year’s festival includes a wide range of screenings and events, from a newly restored print of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest introduced by actor Michael Douglas, to a retrospective of actor John Garfield, and the world premieres of new Czech films.
This year’s program also includes the cinematic version of the Czech video game Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, and several Czech and international filmmakers will present their latest work in person. Krieps joins a distinguished slate of international guests being honored for their contributions to global cinema.
