The Czech Republic has submitted Vaclav Marhoul’s dark and disturbing black-and-white film The Painted Bird for the best international feature category at the 92nd Academy Awards. The controversial adaptation of Jerzy Kosinski’s novel about a young Jewish boy wandering alone in Nazi-occupied Poland, where he witnesses gruesome atrocities, has prompted mass walkouts during screenings both at the Venice film festival, where it had its world premiere, and in Toronto.
