about the film
During the lives of three generations of Schichts the family’s soap empire boomed. Its fame spread far beyond the borders of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy and later of the independent Czechoslovakia. The Schichts started out in the basement of their house and ended up as joint founders of the multinational conglomerate Unilever, which still exists today.
In interwar Czechoslovakia the name Schicht was equal in reputation to names such as Škoda, Baťa, Kolben and Daněk. As well as the legendary soap with the stag, the family of industrialists made Elida cosmetics and Ceres fats. The Schichts had a social programme for their employees that was unique for its time. They were pioneers of advertising. They encouraged technological innovation in various fields, including aviation and film – it is thanks to them that the first sound film in the Czech lands was shown in Ústí nad Labem. The family’s descendants are currently scattered all over the world. How do they perceive the Schicht inheritance?
A word from the director
In 2017 I filmed an interview in Munich with Constantin Werner, the US-based director of the film The Pagan Queen, about what led him to make a film about the legendary Czech prophetess Libuše. He said his family had a close relationship to the Czech lands, and I asked him to bring something from his parents’ house in Munich that conveyed that relationship. He brought an enamel sign featuring an advert for the soap with the stag. Constantin is the great grandson of Heinrich Schicht, the last director of the Schicht factory in Ústí.
I found Constantin Werner’s vivid retelling of his family history so compelling that I decided to find out more about the Schichts. I was amazed at the breadth of their activities, their patronage of the arts and their educational activity. Their relationship to the place in which they lived and did business. Their unique personal talents, and, last but not least, the admirable approach to life that helped them accept with grace the vagaries of fate and the losses that came their way. They did not lose faith, did not complain and tried to focus on the things that brought them joy in life. The ups and downs of their family business are fascinating, and today almost unknown.
our team
Taťána Marková – direction, story
Taťána Marková is the director of three documentaries produced by Film&Sociologie – Revolution Girls (2009, One World, AFO, Doc Europe III Portugal, shown on Czech Television), What to Tell the Kids? (2014, Febiofest Bratislava, shown on HBO CR) and Libussa Unbound (2019, 8th Indian Cine Film Festival Honorable Jury Mention and 5th Indian World Festival in Hyderabad shown on Czech Television).
The theme of a family divided is one that is personally close to her. While the Schichts found themselves on different sides of the front in the Second World War, her family was divided by the iron curtain.
Martin Krsek – idea
Martin Krsek has worked in the Municipal Museum of Ústí nad Labem since 2007 as a historian and curator of the museum’s collections, and now heads the historical department. He is the author of the publication The Schicht Epic and the curator of the exhibition of the same name, as well as of the exhibitions The Elida Girl and The Schicht Flight – 101 Years. He specialises in the history of the 19th and 20th centuries with a focus on the north Bohemian region, where he was born and where he lives.
His ancestors worked in the Schicht factory, including his great-great-grandfather, who survived the massacre of the German population on Ústí’s Edvard Beneš Bridge in July 1945.
Petr Vejslík – DOP
As a cinematographer, Petr Vejslík has travelled over four continents. He shoots feature and documentary films and recordings of musical and cultural events. He works with Czech Television, BBC, Arte and Mezo.
His extensive filmography includes:
Ivan Kroupa - Figures of Houses (dir. Jan Gogola Jr., 2011),
The Good Life of the Falcon Bendy (dir. Pavel Jurda, 2018),
Ondřej Sekora - Work of All Kinds (dir. Pavel Jirásek, 2019).
He doesn’t like washing, but if he has to, then only with the stag.
Vojtěch Knot – sound
As a sound engineer, Vojtěch Knot works mostly on the shooting of documentary films. He is also the author of the music for the National Theatre’s podcasts. He participated in the successful podcast series Missing for Audionaut. Films on which he has worked include:
Tribes – Rainbow (dir. Jan Látal, ČT, 2015),
As If We Should Die Today (dir. Roman Vávra, 2016),
Two Roads (dir. Radovan Síbrt, 2019),
Alchemical Furnace (dir. Jan Daňhel, Adam Oľha, 2020).
He grew up in a Czech emigré family in West Germany, and German is his friend.
Šárka Sklenářová – editor
Šárka Sklenářová is a film editor, assistant editor and script supervisor on documentary, animated and feature films. She has worked frequently with the documentary makers Olga Malířová Špátová (Karel, Pavel Černoch – enfant terrible?, Emma and Kuba) and Kateřina Hager (Children Online, Marriage). She runs the film club Film for Neighbours in the Prague suburb of Suchdol and helps to organise the dance festival KoresponDance. For F&S she has worked as an editor on the following films:
Bees flew beautifully (dir. Karel Čtveráček, 2009),
Fragments of PK (dir. Jana Počtová, 2013),
Meeting with Libuše (dir. Taťána Marková, 2019).
She washes only with the stag and the stag is her lucky animal.
Ivo Bystřičan – script editor
As a scriptwriter and director Ivo Bystričan has created a number of documentary films focusing on social themes, such as Copper Age (2010), My Last 150 000 Cigarettes (2013), Byeway (2014), Open Fortress (2019) and Kovy Fixes History (2020). As a documentary dramaturg he has cooperated on the Czech Television series Tribes and Marathon Gang and the films:
Searching for the Exit (dir. Michal Pavlásek, 2015),
Anticharter, loyality mechanism (dir. Pavel Křemen, 2017),
The Third Human Torch (dir. Martin Řezníček, 2017),
Hagana Actions (dir. Pavel Křemen, 2018).
The Schichts started out in the basement of a village house. Such were the beginnings of many industrial empires. The company’s success was due to most of the family members applying their individual levels of expertise. What does it take to be a part of a family corporation?
Jan Bodnár – executive producer
As a producer Jan Bodnár works with Media Voice (How I Became a Partisan) and GNOMON Production (Dunaj of Consciousness, Miri Fajta, Healing Me). In 2016–2019 he worked as a dramaturg on the queer film festival Mezipatra. He also works as a journalist for the magazine A2, Cinepur and the Czech Radio station Vltava.
I am looking forward to our film revealing to its audience the secret of the symbol many generations have grown up with and the dramatic story of the family who created it.
Jarmila Poláková – producer, F&S
As a producer Jarmila Poláková took part in the creation of several films by Pavel Koutecký, including Citizen Havel (dir. Pavel Koutecký, Miroslav Janek, 2008). Her most recent films are:
Libussa Unbound (dir. Taťána Marková, 2019),
Pilgrimage to the Mountains (dir. Karel Čtveráček, 2020),
How I Became a Partisan (dir. Vera Lacková, 2021).
The image of the stag on the soap has stayed with me my whole life. Will I find out why the stag?
Film & Sociology – producer
was created in 1991. Over 170 documentary films under the heading F&S have been shown on Czech Television, and 6 films in cinematic release.
Two F&S films have won Czech Lions for best documentary film – in 2008 Citizen Havel, one of the most successful documentary films to be released in Czech cinemas after 1989, with 160 thousand cinema admissions, and in 2014 Olga, directed by Miroslav Janek. F&S is the co-founder of the Pavel Koutecký Award for documentary film directors making their debut, and the coproducer of the ELBEDOCK festival.
Krutón – co-producer
Krutón is a production and distribution company, and the organiser of the festival Young Film Festival – an international film festival for young audiences (aged 12–17) with a focus on film education. Films it has distributed include Gottland (2014), FC Roma (2016), Vienna Calling (2018) and Moravia, O Fair Land III. (2019).
gallery
18
photos
How we started
March–May 2021
12
photos
Vintage promotion materials
for products of the Schicht company
in progress
contact
Producer: Film & Sociologie, s.r.o.
Pod Zvonařkou 10, CZ-120 00 Prague 2
facebook.com/FilmandSociologie
Jarmila Poláková info@filmasociologie.cz
Taťána Marková fastana@seznam.cz
Za finanční podpory
Státní fond kinematografie fondkinematografie.cz
Ústecká komunitní nadace (Fond Pavly a Pavla Redlichových) komunitninadace.cz
Česko-německý fond budoucnosti www.fondbudoucnosti.cz
Město Ústí nad Labem www.usti-nad-labem.cz
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