The Wish To Be a Red Indian: Kafka and Cinema 2024 / Kafka / USA, France 1991
The titular hero of this legendary film, set and shot in magical Prague, was played memorably by Jeremy Irons in a work that blurs the lines between The Trial and The Castle (while incorporating a series of references to the writer’s life and to other texts by him). His Kafka is trying to track down a missing co-worker; in the process he chances upon a mysterious conspiracy involving murder, corruption and bureaucracy, without being absolutely sure the events unfolding are actually happening or whether they’re figments of the writer’s imagination. Despite a self-critical appraisal from Soderbergh himself who, thirty years later, came up with a new version entitled Mr. Kneff, his Kafka has, over time, become a cult film worthy of rediscovery.
Lorenzo Esposito
98 min / Color, DCP
Director Steven Soderbergh
/ Screenplay Lem Dobbs
/ Dir. of Photography Walt Lloyd
/ Music Cliff Martinez
/ Sound Mark Mangini
/ Editor Steven Soderbergh
/ Art Director Gavin Bocquet
/ Producer Stuart Cornfeld, Harry Benn
/ Production Pricel, Baltimore Pictures
/ Cast Jeremy Irons, Theresa Russell, Ian Holm, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Joel Grey, Jeroen Krabbé, Alec Guinness
Steven Soderbergh (1963, Atlanta, USA). Selected filmography: Sex, Lies and Videotape (1989), Kafka (1991), King of the Hill (1993), Traffic (2000), Erin Brockovich (2000), Ocean's Eleven (2001), Side Effects (2013), The Laundromat (2019), Mr. Kneff (2024).
Steven Soderbergh
Film Director
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