A Marriage Tested by Guilt and the Impossibility of Moving On

Read Time:5 Minute, 36 Second

MOVIE REVIEW
Father (Otec)
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Genre: Drama
Year Released: 2025
Runtime: 1h 43m
Director(s): Tereza Nvotová
Writer(s): Tereza Nvotová, Dušan Budzak
Cast: Milan Ondrík, Dominika Morávková, Aňa Geislerová, Martina Sľúková, Dominika Zajcz, Peter Ondrejička, Ingrid Timková, Peter Bebjak, Roman Polák, Jiří Konvalinka
Where to Watch: shown at the 2025 Venice Film Festival

RAVING REVIEW: FATHER is a film built on silence, endurance, and a kind of emotion that pulls the viewer into its world and refuses to let go. Directed by filmmaker Tereza Nvotová, the film has its world premiere at the 2025 Venice Film Festival in the Orizzonti section. Here, Nvotová presents a story that begins with a single, devastating mistake and spirals into an exploration of guilt, love, and the fragile limits of forgiveness.

At the center is Michal, played by Milan Ondrík, one of Slovakia’s most respected actors. The tragedy that destroys his life is a real-world phenomenon often referred to as “forgotten baby syndrome.” It’s an unthinkable lapse, and Nvotová makes the decision not to sensationalize the event itself but instead to linger in the aftermath. The narrative is structured around Michal’s isolation, the disintegration of his marriage, and the looming possibility of prison. The question that hangs over every moment isn’t whether he deserves punishment, but whether he deserves to go on living at all.

What separates FATHER from other portrayals of grief and culpability is Nvotová’s stylistic gamble: long, unbroken takes that place the audience inside the moment without respite. Nvotová has described her approach as wanting to force the viewer to inhabit her character’s world without the safe distance editing usually provides. The result is a cinematic language that feels almost suffocating in its intimacy. Each movement of the camera is choreographed with precision, yet it breathes with the actors, following them through spaces that feel at once claustrophobic and wide open. The effect is like living inside a wound that refuses to close.

Ondrík’s performance anchors the film with a level of devotion rarely seen. Nvotová has admitted that he considered this the most difficult role of his career, and it shows. His Michal is a man drowning in shame, incapable of escape. Ondrík does not play the role so much as letting himself become it, embodying the unbearable weight of a father who has lost everything not through malice, but through a momentary failure of memory. His commitment is palpable in every scene, and it would be no surprise if this performance earns him international recognition.

Opposite him, Dominika Morávková as Zuzka offers a portrayal of a woman torn between devastation and the slightest traces of compassion. Their scenes together capture the impossible tension of love that cannot be vanquished, even when it feels unbearable to sustain. Aňa Geislerová as Eva brings her intensity, further layering the emotion. The decision to have Ondrík and Morávková spend months bonding with the child actors beforehand pays off in fragile moments of realism that heighten the story’s impact.

Cinematographer Adam Suzin crafts shots that feel fluid yet weighted, often shifting seamlessly between handheld and crane perspectives within a single take. The camera is less an observer than a participant, moving as though tethered to Michal. Editing is almost invisible—deliberately so—since the film’s power lies in its refusal to cut away.

Composer Pjoni was present during production, composing pieces alongside the shoot so that music feels less like an overlay and more like a pulse of the film’s core. There are moments when dialogue recedes and sound design takes over, pulling the viewer into Michal’s dissociation, where guilt and despair distort perception. It’s in these passages that Nvotová achieves something rare: a direct translation of internal torment into audiovisual experience.

What’s most striking about the film is its refusal to absolve or condemn outright. Nvotová crafts Michal not as a figure to be pitied or hated, but as a human being caught in a psychological storm. She has said she intended to leave space for audiences to form their own judgments, and that choice makes the film both unsettling and necessary. Viewers are forced to confront the uncomfortable truth that empathy and judgment are not mutually exclusive—they coexist, painfully, within us.

Still, the film will not be for everyone. Its long takes and refusal to cut away demand patience and immersion, and some may find the pacing punishing. The unrelenting proximity can feel overwhelming, bordering on oppressive. Yet this is by design. Nvotová does not want us to observe Michal’s suffering from a safe distance; she wants us to live inside it, to breathe it, to feel its weight, whether one finds that cathartic or unbearable will determine the personal impact of the film.

FATHER stands as a bold and haunting work. Nvotová proves that she is a filmmaker who thrives on the most difficult subjects, finding not sensationalism but humanity in the darkest corners. It is not an easy watch, nor is it meant to be. It is a story of guilt, endurance, and the frail thread of love that somehow persists even in the wake of unimaginable loss.

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[photo courtesy of DANAE PRODUCTION, MOLOKO FILM, LAVA FILMS, CESKÁ TELEVIZE, INTRAMOVIES]

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