Broken Voices

Thirteen-year-old Karolina is one of many hopefuls who dream of joining Canticella, a prestigious girls’ choir in Prague. The level of quality is high, and the charismatic conductor Vit Macha is highly respected by both the younger and older generations. Her older sister is already a member, and the conductor quickly notices Karolina’s obvious talent. She is among several girls selected to compete for a spot in an upcoming choir competition in New York, and the opportunities seem endless. But beneath the surface lies a dark secret.

Broken Voices is a powerful deconstruction of the encounter between youthful innocence and authoritarian abuse of power. It is based on the true story of the girls' choir Bambini di Praga and a massive sex scandal that shook the Czech Republic. The film's intimate and sometimes mysterious visual language explores the friendship and rivalry among the girls in the choir, as well as the conductor's boundary-crossing behavior, and how such situations can arise.