• Golden Globe Awards

Ice Mother (Bába z ledu) (Czech Republic/Slovakia/France)

Bohdan Sláma’s film Ice Mother is a romantic drama about an old woman who finds love in the least expected circumstances during a cold winter. After her husband dies, Hana finds herself a 67-year-old widow who lives alone in a small town, with nothing else to wait for in her life but the weekly Sunday visit from her two argumentative and self-centered sons and their families.Her oldest son, Petr (Marek Daniel), is an underpaid civil servant, who owes money to his family, while the youngest son, Ivan (Václav Neužil) is a successful businessman with an arrogant wife, Kateřina (Tatiana Vilhelmová). They are parents of a troubled young son, Ivanek (Daniel Vízek), who is bullied in school and interacts better with technology than people.For Hana, those visits are now a family tradition, so she continues to live alone and selflessly care for her family until one day, while on a stroll with her grandson, Ivanek, she sees a man in danger, drowning in the cold river, and helps to rescue him. His name is Brona, and from this fateful encounter Hana develops a friendship and an unexpected romance along with a new hobby as she meets a new group of ice swimmers, which Brona belongs to.Both Hana and her grandson are attracted to the good-spirited swimmers, and they attend a competition with them the following weekend. The sad little boy unwinds with the gruff old men who banter with him and play uproarious games of cards. And Hana warms to maverick Brona, who lives in a converted bus with a jealous chicken called Adela. Hana and Brona develop a strong chemistry, that slowly becomes a solid romance, which neither was really expecting or seeking. However, when Hana discovers that the straightforward Bronia has a dark secret, she is once again forced to decide what she really wants in life.Sláma is a Czech director born in Opava, the Czech Republic, in 1967. His debut feature, Wild Bees, won a Tiger Award at the Rotterdam Film Festival in 2002.  In 2006, his film Something Like Happiness received the Golden Seashell in San Sebastian Film Festival.  Here he delivers a charming romantic drama starring the acclaimed Slovak actress Zuzana Kronerova and Czech actor Pavel Nový in the main roles. A story that reflects the inner soul of family ties and how loneliness and love can become allies when people least expect it.