Milky Way, with a subtitle that reads “ambient,” is composed of ten breath-taking static takes without music or dialogues. Melancholic and funny micro stories take place within the time-and-space frame of a single day and present events from everyday life. However, their length and hypnotizing mix of real sounds from the environment and various field recordings provide them with an unconcealed meditative dimension.

Milky Way captivates the audience with its excellent mise-en-scene, consistent distancing of the camera and a precise soundtrack of ambient music as defined by English theoretician and composer Brian Eno in the 1970s. However, what makes Fliegauf’s film a true twin of ambient music is its ability to bring the viewer to various levels of attention and the way in which the author uses details within and beyond his tableaux vivants. Fliegauf’s ten cinematographic haiku will enthral the viewer in the archetypal darkness of a movie hall and in the multi-disciplinary territory of a modern gallery.

In 2007, the film won at the prestigious film festival in Locarno, Switzerland, in the section Concorso Cineasti del Presente. At the Hungarian Film Week festival, it was awarded the Special Award of the Jury and another two awards in the category of Best Camera and Best Sound.

Aleš Stuchlý

Experimental / Poetic
Director a Screenplay: Benedek Fliegauf
Director of Photography: Gergely Pohárnok
Music: Raptor's Kollektíva
Cast: Barbara Balogh, Sándor Balogh, Danny Barnes, János Breckl, Barbara Thurzó

Film critic and journalist Aleš Stuchlý (1981) studied film science at the Faculty of Arts of the Charles University. Since 2009 he has worked in Czech Radio – Radio Wave, where he hosts the film magazine Čelisti (Jaws). In 2015 he started working for Film Europe, where he organises festivals Be2Can, Weird Europe, and Scandi. In 2017 he was a member of the jury of European Cinemas Label at the festival in Locarno, a member of the jury of both the ARAS award and the short movies’ competition at the AFO festival in Olomouc. Since 2019 he has worked as a decision-maker and speaker for the Karlovy Vary Film Festival.

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