“To commit suicide you need a strong will, my child. Something you certainly don’t have. Accept it.” Yikes. This is definitely not what someone needs to hear after a suicide attempt lands them in the hospital, but it’s what the titular character of “I, Olga Hepnarova” is told when she returns home after the incident. A new trailer for the award-winning Czech drama makes it abundantly clear that Olga (Michalina Olszanska, “The Lure”) is in a bad place, and she’s not receiving the help she needs.
The black and white film, directed by Petr Kazda and Tomás Weinreb, is based on a true story. “Hepnarova was a young, lonely lesbian outsider from a coldhearted family who couldn’t play the part society desired of her,” “I, Olga Hepnarova’s” official synopsis hints. “Her paranoid self-examination and inability to connect with other people eventually drove her over the edge of humanity when she was only 22 years old.”
“I know I’m a psycho, but an enlightened one. One day you’ll pay for your laughter and my tears,” says Olga in the spot.
On July 10, 1973, she “drove a rented truck into a group of about 25 people waiting for a tram in Prague, Czechoslovakia, all aged between 60 to 79, killing eight of them,” the film’s press materials detail. “Before the murder, she sent a letter to two newspapers explaining her action as revenge for all the hatred against her by her family and the world.”
“I, Olga Hepnarova” picked up awards at fests including the Minsk International Film Festival and Vilnius International Film Festival, and will open in NY March 24 with a wider release to follow.
