PUPENDO European Showcase

Part dark comedy, part biting drama, PUPENDO navigates that nasty grey area between complicity and compliance that pervaded society in the former Soviet Bloc countries leading up to the fall of socialism.

Mora is a highly talented sculptor who has fallen from his former prestigious posit ion at the Academy of Art; now, he barely makes ends meet. Mora’s former student, the socially ambitious Magda, has made a much more practical marriage to high school principal Mila. This couple operates as deeply within the Communist system as Mara and his wife Alena live outside it. Soon, circumstances reunite the former teacher and student, providing a forum for all manner of political blustering and shows of artistic temperament.

“Pupendo” is a child’s game in which a prankster promises some thing mystical and pleasurable to his victim-then delivers a sharp slap. Director Jan Hrebejk (the Academy Award®-nominated DIVIDED WE FALL) paints a rich portrait of a very specific time and place.