Eighty Letters is an autobiographical film based on memories of the director and the surviving correspondence between his parents. The story takes place in Czechoslovakia in 1987. The father has defected to England and the mother and her son are planning to leave the country to be reunited with him. Events of the film are viewed from the boy’s perspective, the exasperated gaze of one lacking experience, his initiation in the course of this single day - the film. His mother’s movements are part of an intensified daily routine, as she maps it out hour by hour. It is a battlefield situation for her. She is on her way, her son catches up with her on that path, but she must act alone if they are to achieve completeness together. “Eighty Letters is about my memories of my mother at the time when my father defected to the West from the totalitarian regime. The story takes place in one day. I still well remember that day. My mother moving about in it like a pre-programmed machine, concentratedly determined to do battle with the communist bureaucracy, driven by one single motive – to get us to Dad. It is an intimate film that was made with modest means. My wish was to tell my own story in a daring way. I think that Eighty Letters will be an original film. I wanted to capture a bit of silence within the contemporary cult of ugliness, noise and tawdry effects. I am not trying to shock in order to attract attention. My intention was to film someone who is loved, and try to portray his sadness, which is white, silent and still, like my film. And with no end.” "I wanted to work with something that was inherent to a certain extent, with something that is very delicate. I didn’t want psychology or a methodical approach to acting, naturally. I was looking for totally elementary things – a look, sadness, happiness. And I think that the non-actors helped give the film its subjectivity."
