You know you’ve made it when people who would never bother reading your books are still familiar with an adjective formed from your name which is used to describe a certain mood or vibe. Such is the case with Franz Kafka, who, despite being on this earth for only 40 years, achieving little recognition during his lifetime, and dying with much of his work still unpublished, is commemorated worldwide through the adjective “kafkaesque.” Trying to define what that world means carries similar risks to trying to define jazz, and like that example it’s one of those times where if you know, you know, and if you don’t, other people’s words won’t help you.
Fortunately for us, Kafka’s friend Max Brot ignored his request to destroy his writings after his death, and today they’re widely available both in the original German and translated into a variety of languages, plus adaptations like Orson Welles’ The Trial (1962) and the 2007 anime short “A Country Doctor” by Koji Yamamura. No matter how much Kafka you read, however, you may find his particular literary aesthetic resists description or explanation, although certainly gallons of ink have been expended trying to do just that. The fact that the image of him most people carry inside their head is bizarrely haunting only lends to the mystique of it all.
Agnieszka Holland’s Franz (2025) is a noble if ultimately unsuccesesful attempt to explore who Kafka was and where his distinctive style came from. To that end, she blends a variety of styles: sometimes this movie takes the tone of an award-bait period drama, sometimes the characters break the fourth wall and address the camera directly as if they were being interviewed, sometimes they provide voice-of-god narration as they were part of a documentary, and sometimes things get as bizarre and surreal as Kafka’s writing itself. She also presents Kafka reading from his works, sometimes with staging of what he’s describing, and those parts are not for the faint of heart. She’s also guilty of a bit of mickey-mousing (don’t think you’re going to get through this without seeing a cockroach, although who knows what an “ungeheures Ungetiefer” would really look like) and the sequences set in the present day are jarring without really adding anything of value.
The role of Franz Kafka is played by first-time film actor Idan Weiss, who certainly looks the part even if his ability to convey much in the way of character is limited. Holland’s intent seems to be to portray Kafka as a person who experienced life at one remove and through the lens of his own unique perception, an approach that may or may not reflect reality but can certainly try one’s patience, particularly in a film that runs over 2 hours. On the other hand, Weiss was nominated for acting awards at several film festivals and won two Best Actor awards, at the 2025 Polish Film Festival and the 2025 Czech Lion Awards, so other opinions are available. The other actors, including Peter Kurth as Kafka’s father Hermann, Katharina Stark as his sister Ottla, Carol Schuler as his fiancé Felice Bauer, and Sebastian Schwarz as Max Brod, are fine but are treated like bit players in Kafka’s story.
Where Franz really shines is in the technical aspects of filmmaking, including cinematography by Tomasz Naumiuk (much of the film was shot in Prague), production design by Heinrich Boraros, art direction by Anna Mayerová, and costume design by Michaela Horejsí. I’m less sold on the screenplay by Holland and Marek Epstein, but this is one beautiful movie and is worth seeing for its visual merits alone. | Sarah Boslaugh
Franz is distributed on Blu-ray and DVD by Kino Lorber. Extras include an interview with director Agnieszka Holland and the film’s theatrical trailer.
