Czech Film Center

Synopsis

"When future generations ask what we were fighting for in World War II, tell them we did it for the story of Lidice." Frank Knox, U.S. Secretary of the Navy (1941-1944)
The burning of this village was Nazi Germany's only officially admitted genocidal act during the war that shook the world during.
It presents to audiences three interconnected stories that unfurl in connection with the tragic burning and razing of Lidice (1942). The first is about an unfortunate family where the patriarch accidentally kills his son in the heat of an argument and is then sentenced to prison. Paradoxically, incarceration saves his life, as he managed to avoid the fate of all the other Lidice residents. The second is the story of a letter that became the pretense for this Nazi massacre, even though it, too, was evidently an innocent lie aimed at covering up for infidelity. The third story is about fear, about personal responsibility and about whether surviving is truly winning when the prize comes in exchange for the loss of once's dignity and honor.