You were born in former Yugoslavia, attended the school in Novi Sad and arrived to Prague in 1991. Did you want to make films and didn’t find needed background in your home country or you were forced to move out by upcoming war and wanted to start your life elsewhere?

FAMU was in Yugoslavia very credible school, well respected and I was longing for studying this prestige school.I came to Czech Republic in time when war broke up in my country and I couldn´t foresee what it´s result and outcome will be.New lease of life as obvious.

Was world of film something you were dreaming about since your childhood or you figured out much later ( in Czech Republic) that it is exactly what you want to do?

Novi Sad didn´t have very active and attractive film scene in my childhood.But he had one cinema where they showed really high quality films.And I was there often, very often in fact so I started to long for knowing the most about film and then it became the ONLY thing, I really wanted to do.

You attended our FAMU (Film and musical academy).How did you master that in foreign language and who taught you there? Were you already focused or you wanted to come through everything and according to results  decide later what would be the best for you?

The beginning was rather entertaining since I more sort of guessed what the teachers said  rather then understand them really.Process of learning the language was very intensive eventhough Czech laguage is very difficult and I can´t say I master it 100% even now.My class was led by Jiří Svoboda, and at that time there were teaching Jaromil Jireš, Věra Chytilová or Zdeněk Syrový.I wasn´t focused and my ideas about film were theoretical, I badly needed to try,

You made short films, video clips, documents and now came your debut feature film.All mentioned disciplines need different kind of filming.Was it part of your professional upgrading or you  were artistically” finding yourself” or it was deliberatelly that you wanted to gain as much experience as possible and go slowly towards you final discipline-feature film?

I think it was just natural thing.I did things that I had possibility to do and I was and am pleased that in every discipline I did, I tried to find as much experience as possible.Feature film was always on cards and route to him wasn´t steady one, the right time for it came NOW.

According to titles of your documentary films” Ten centuries of architecture” etc one would say, you are interested mainly in human being and the way he/she lives.Now you made film MY2, which is again about everyday life.Do you have some universal idea what you want to say by your films, what you want do discover or it is diffrent from film to film?

Every director imprints into his work his own attidude towards the world.Everyday´s life is the never ending inspiration and I like to look at some things under some kind of microscope, see some connections among “ small things”.It is also decided by genre I was making up until now. That were small budget projects which I wanted to do as best as I could and with best ambition I could.It often meant to look at some things very closely, dive into details in interhuman relationship.

What, apart luck, must have debut making director to catch attention of producer who will finance his/her film? Is it quality screenplay which assures producer that he won´t loose money or it must be personality of director, his energy, attitude and guts which assure producer that he/she is right person to invest money into and screenplay can be altered or mended later?

It is mixture of things. You  approach producer with certain energy, certain topic in certain time of your and his career.Then the” topic” starts to work itelf, show it´s life ability, people react onto it, talk about it, join in.It´s process.And it helps when re-writing the screenply is the part of this process.During re-writing all concerned:director, producer and screenplay writer tune their ideas about story of the whole film into common language.

Screenplay of your debut film MY2 was written by author Radka Denemarková.Did you approach her or vice versa? Have you worked together before? How long did you tune the screenplay and how long was the film shot?

I approachd Radka.We have worked together on one screenplay before, whose realisation was postponed.In this situation I wanted to do very chamber film and when I came to her with idea about MY2, we worked together for weeked and tested the topic.It was a joy to write together and first screenplay version was made within few months.Two years later the film itself was made, we were filming 28 days. Before that I directed Radka´s theatre play “ Spací vany” in Theatre  “Na zábradlí”.It was our first project and we were very happy with the outcome.

The topic of MY2 is interesting, bearing in mind inconsistent attitude towards gay culture.Was it exactly this what made you decide to film this, say your view, add towards discussion with it or you thought it is inteesting for debut, it could be protuberant hence having chance for success?

Our film is not about gay culture.It is about general form of love and understanding which refuses to be labelled and boxed.I don´t think, it is very good in film industry and specially for debut making director to speculate about final effect in order” not to be a flop”.I even didn´t want to add anything into gay problems´s discussion.I had in mind one specific hero who is a gay and lives different way of life but he is interesting person.

Star actor was Ondřej Nosálek who is unknown face but he played very freely and convincingly.How many actors did you try before you pick him up and was it deliberate to get unknown face so viewers would believe him?

With casting director Kateřina Oujezdová we looked closely at known actors but we realized that none of them would make it the way we wanted to, so after that we started to search.It looked hopelessly for while but when we found Ondřej it was spot on.So we didn´t try many actors, we thought about many of them but we were lucky to find Ondřej Nosálek.

In your future project would you like to go your own innovative way even when you get mixture of results and critics or you intend to bet on used topics but take them from different angle?

See, here is again the calculation about my future career.I don´t think that calculation will pay off, it definitelly isn´t my way.I think the calculation is visible at these films and it doesn´t help them one bit.It all is based on artistic tension, curiosity, lust to make things the best possible way.And what will be specific form of our project it remains to be seen.

What made you come and show MY2 on Cinema Open festival in preview?Did you look for place where to test the water and Hradec Králové was at hand or you wanted to go directly to movies but when offer came from Hradec Králové you thought it could be a good chance?

Well, they invited us!And since my childhood I love club events and small scale events so there wasn´t anything to think about, I just went.It was nice coinsidence, festival took place few days before Prague premiere  so it looked as positive thing for both parties.

What is your attitude towards independent film and whole independent culture? Do you take it as fresh air in still waters of commercial trash?

For me the most important is the line which divides quality from trash, interesting content

from repeating form. And  from so called independent culture became the brand name, there exists dull, empty films that were made according to “ independent “ stencil.It is truth that in Czech Republic the commercial film is on pretty low level and hence any attempt to do independant thing is taken more kindly.

When you have strong producer behind your back and make your debut film, do you feel independently or very tied?And do you think that success and producer make independence bigger or it is more surpressed by that?

It is based on harmony on common film vision between producer and director.If you don´t have it, co-operation has no sence.If both parties try to define the vision, strong producer is the bonus.Today, there is the situation that producers fight for independence and try to find the ways?

Today, all is about money, rating, product placement.Do you think that internet will allow lowering the cost of advertisment campaign and set rules will go out of the window, so normal film could be watched by millions around the world without having to be screened in Cannes?

Vision of ideal future  are enlightened film servers, where one can easily orientate in that huge amount of films which are made and then comes noble and fair way ho to buy that film for PC browser.Oh, and also those quality cinemas.