“Memory is like a machine. And it’s not perfect.”

A tragic mistake shatters the life of a devoted father, shaking his marriage and isolating him in guilt. As the threat of prison looms, he begins to question whether he deserves to go on living. But when he and his wife come to see that the tragedy was not a personal failure, but something rooted deep in the architecture of the human mind, a fragile path toward forgiveness begins to emerge. Even with this understanding, the question remains: can love survive what no heart was built to endure?

With Father, Tereza Nvotová offers a deeply unsettling and devastating film that doubles as a solemn and impeccably executed narrative about a tragedy of insurmountable proportions.

Love, Pressure, and Cruelty

Father is a film that is both beautiful and very difficult. A hard film to watch, one that will bring tears to anyone of sound constitution. It is also a work that will spark debates. Is someone who forgets their child in the car a terrible person, or can this truly happen to anyone?

What the movie primarily shows is the love of a father who, under pressure and stress, makes a monumental mistake, one that people are not ready to accept as an error that a responsible person can make. But above all, it is a mistake that he himself will have to forgive, if that is possible.

This film is above all a look at the feelings and emotions that pass through the people involved in the event. As a parent, it is just as difficult to forgive as it is easy to understand.

A little more…

It must be understood that Tereza Nvotová’s feature film does not aim to condemn a bad father, but rather to understand the feelings and events that follow this type of accident.

Some will say it is murder. Others, that it is because this man is a bad father. Others, that it is because he did not love his daughter. And still others will understand how this kind of horror can happen, and although shocked by the child’s death, they will understand and not judge the man behind the mistake.

Be that as it may, Father is a film to see. But be warned, it is tough.

Father will be screened at VIFF on October 2, 6, and 12, 2025.

Trailer