Prague, Oct 15 (CTK) – The Miracle Film company along with the Brazilian Pentagram is shooting a documentary about the life and work of Alfred Willer, a Brazilian architect of Czech origin, in Prague and its vicinity, Marie Grofova, from Miracle Film, told CTK yesterday.
The film, produced with Uruguayan-born Brazilian Oscar-winning cameraman Cesar Charlone, is directed by Willer’s daughter Marina Willer, Grofova said.
“In 1930, Alfred Willer was born in Kaznejov near Plzen, west Bohemia, as a son of mechanical engineer Vilem Willer, who discovered the synthetic production of citric acid,” Grofova said.
“After the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1939, the family was forced out of Kaznejov,” she added.
“At first, its members wanted to leave abroad. However, as they were stripped of their passports, the Willers left for Prague where they were one of the only 12 Jewish families to have survived the Holocaust,” Grofova said.
“This happened thanks to the patent for the production of the strategic substance, the citric acid,” Grofova said.
In 1947, the Willer family moved to Brazil and because of the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia in 1948 they never returned home.
In Brazil, Willer is considered one of architectural legends alongside Oscar Niemeyer.
In Curitiba, he laid the foundations of its zoning plan and designed a number of remarkable buildings.
