Some of the films from the past year’s most prominent European festivals arrive in Prague this week as Be2Can returns for its 13th edition, bringing eight selections from Cannes, Berlin and Venice to Czech cinemas from Oct. 7–14.
Organized by Film Europe, the annual showcase opens Wednesday at Prague’s Kino Lucerna with Minotaur, the new drama from exiled Russian filmmaker Andrey Zvyagintsev. The film won the Grand Prix at this year’s Cannes Film Festival and has been selected as France’s submission for the Academy Award for best international feature.
Other highlights range from Nicolas Winding Refn’s Her Private Hell and Shahrbanoo Sadat’s No Good Men to a theatrical return for Wim Wenders’ Oscar-nominated 2011 documentary Pina. Screenings will take place at cinemas across the Czech Republic, with Prague venues including Edison Filmhub, Kino Lucerna, Cinema City Flora and Kino Kavalírka.
Cannes highlights led by Zvyagintsev and Refn
Zvyagintsev returns to filmmaking with Minotaur, his first feature since Loveless in 2017. Set in Russia in 2022, the 140-minute drama follows Gleb, a successful businessman whose professional and personal life begins to unravel against the backdrop of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Unable to shoot in his native country, Zvyagintsev filmed the French-Latvian-German production in Latvia.
The director, whose previous films include Leviathan, Elena and Venice Golden Lion winner The Return, has lived outside Russia since 2021 and was designated a “foreign agent” by Russian authorities. Minotaur marks one of his most direct engagements with the country’s contemporary political climate, examining the moral compromises created by mobilization and war.
Be2Can will hold its opening preview of Minotaur at Kino Lucerna on Oct. 7 at 5:30 p.m., ahead of additional screenings during the festival.
Also arriving from Cannes is Her Private Hell, Nicolas Winding Refn’s first feature since The Neon Demon a decade ago. Starring Sophie Thatcher, Charles Melton, Kristine Froseth and Diego Calva, the sci-fi horror drama draws on Refn’s own near-death experience and combines existential drama with supernatural horror and the neon-heavy visual approach associated with films including Drive.
Bruno Dumont’s Red Rocks, meanwhile, comes to Czech cinemas after screening in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight. Set on the French Riviera, the film follows rival groups of young children and turns their summer games, friendships and first romantic feelings into a loose variation on Romeo and Juliet.
The Cannes portion of the lineup is rounded out by Bérenger Thouin’s The Golden Age, an historical drama combining fiction and archival footage in the story of a butcher’s daughter seeking to escape the circumstances of her birth against the upheavals of the 20th century.
Berlin, Venice and a return for Wim Wenders’ ‘Pina’
Be2Can’s Berlin selections include No Good Men, the latest film from Afghan filmmaker Shahrbanoo Sadat. The romantic comedy-drama opened the 2026 Berlinale and follows Naru, a camerawoman at a Kabul television station, as she develops a relationship with a colleague shortly before the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.
Sadat, who also stars in the film, draws on real events while using romance and comedy to depict everyday life in Afghanistan during a period usually represented onscreen through war and political upheaval. The film is the third installment in a planned five-part series inspired by the writings of Anwar Hashimi.
Turkish filmmaker Emin Alper’s Salvation, about an escalating land dispute between two Kurdish clans in a remote mountain village, also joins the selection from Berlin.
Venice is represented by Damien Hauser’s Memory of Princess Mumbi, an afrofuturist film set in 2093 that examines memory, filmmaking and human relationships in the age of artificial intelligence. The Swiss-Kenyan filmmaker’s feature premiered in the Giornate degli Autori sidebar at the 2025 Venice Film Festival before traveling to festivals including London, Zurich and Toronto.
The program’s lone repertory selection is Pina, Wenders’ 2011 3D documentary tribute to German choreographer Pina Bausch. Originally conceived as a collaboration between Wenders and Bausch, the project became a memorial after the choreographer died shortly before filming was due to begin. The film later earned an Academy Award nomination for best documentary feature.
Be2Can will again partner with Prague’s FAMU, with a five-member student jury evaluating films during the festival. Winners will be announced during the closing evening at Edison Filmhub on Oct. 14.
The 13th Be2Can festival runs Oct. 7–14 at participating cinemas in Prague and across the Czech Republic.
