Franz 2025

“Franz is a writer who doesn’t like to talk,” says Franz Kafka’s agent in this playful and oddly endearing biopic of the enigmatic Czech author, who died in 1924 aged just 40. Kafka’s output was slim but influential, the film notes, reporting that works about Kafka outnumber pieces by him at a rate of 10 million to 1. That ratio is more impressive given that they were smuggled out of Europe in a suitcase at the dawn of the Second World War, and, given Kafka’s Jewish roots, could very easily have been lost forever.

Coincidentally, Agnieszka Holland’s film Franz — which competes in Competition at this year’s San Sebastian Film Festival — appears shortly after the loss of another mighty 20th century artist, David Lynch, who described Kafka as “the one artist that I feel could be my brother.” Lynch would likely have approved of this experimental take on Kafka’s life, with its dryly humorous flourishes and rich, almost Magrittean color palette. 

 — Damon Wise, Deadline