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Cannes, 7 April 2013. Beta Film has picked up the distribution rights for HBO Europe’s highly acclaimed three part miniseries Burning Bush. Directed by Academy Award nominee Agnieszka Holland, Burning Bush depicts the story of Jan Palach, the young student who made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of freedom in the Prague of January 1969, and the legal fight by his family to clear his name in the face of the oppressive communist propaganda machine. Burning Bush rolled out very successfully on HBO Europe across its fifteen countries at the beginning of this year. Beta Film will present Burning Bush to the international market at the trade fare MIPTV in Cannes in April and highlights the extraordinary production at its traditional Beta Brunch at MIP TV on Tuesday, April 9th.
Antony Root, Executive Vice President, Original Programming and Production, HBO Europe, said, "We are delighted to be entering into a distribution agreement with Beta for Burning Bush. The wonderful work of Agnieszka Holland and her team has already been acclaimed by critics and audiences in central Europe. We are now keen to bring the miniseries to the wider international market. We are certain the moving story of Jan Palach's sacrifice and the events that followed will connect with audiences around the world."
Beta Film CEO Jan Mojto: “How do we make choices when we face mechanisms of terror in a totalitarian system? Whether in Germany under the Nazi regime or in Eastern Europe under Communist rule, the last century is a source of fascinating stories of betrayal and adaptation but also of courage and revolution. That Agnieszka Holland precisely knows this situation is what makes Burning Bush so intriguing. I am sure this program will appeal to those who remember but it will also inspire younger audiences. We are happy to continue our relationship with Agnieszka Holland following our cooperation on her Academy Award nomination for In Darkness and we are happy to partner with HBO Europe is they continue to create premium programming in Europe.”
Based on real characters and events, the three part drama is HBO Europe’s most ambitious, big-budget project to date. The film returns to a pivotal time in modern Czech history, beginning with a reconstruction of the shocking act of a student of the Charles University’s Faculty of Arts, who in protest of the Soviet occupation, set himself on fire in Prague’s Wenceslas Square on the 16th of January 1969, and died four days later. Through the story of the brave defense attorney Dagmar Burešová, who defended Palach’s legacy in a doomed lawsuit, the film examines the transformations taking place in Czechoslovak society after the invasion of the armies of the Warsaw Pact in August of 1968. It depicts the beginnings of Czech and Slovak resistance against the occupation, which reached its apex with the mass protests during Palach’s funeral. It also shows the nation’s gradual resignation under the pressure of fear and harsher persecution.
The anniversary of Jan Palach’s death inspired a new generation of students to start protests that led to the eventual fall of communism in Czechoslovakia, part of the eventual destruction of the Iron Curtain. Lawyer Dagmar Burešová, who spent her life representing dissident opposition leaders, became the first Minister of Justice in a free Czechoslovakia.
Burning Bush, based on a script by Stepan Hulik and starring Tatiana Pauhofova, Jaroslava Pokorna, Petr Stach and Jan Budar, was produced by HBO Europe (Antony Root, Tereza Polachova) and Nutprodukce Production (Tomas Hruby, Pavla Kubeckova).
About HBO Europe
Home Box Office, America’s leading premium television network, provides basic and premium pay television entertainment channels for cable TV, Direct-to-Home and MMDS platforms. HBO Europe - owned by Home Box Office, Inc. - currently provides basic and premium channels to 15 countries: Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Romania, the Netherlands, Bulgaria, Moldova, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Kosovo, Montenegro, Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In the Netherlands, HBO Europe provides HBO HD and SD channels, HBO On Demand and HBO GO through HBO Nederland, a joint venture between HBO and Ziggo BV.
HBO Europe offers five high quality movie channels (HBO, HBO2, HBO Comedy, Cinemax and Cinemax2) and six high definition channels (HBO HD, HBO2 HD, HBO3 HD, HBO Comedy HD, Cinemax HD and Cinemax2 HD), as well as the subscription video on demand service HBO ON DEMAND, and the broadband SVOD service, HBO GO.
HBO Europe is headquartered in Budapest, Hungary.
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