A kind of documentary that is impossible to recreate in fiction, Marie Dvořáková World Between Us is only partially about photographs: its focus is on photographer Marie Tomanova as a real, multi-faceted human.
Ahead of the film’s Australian debut, CaSFFA committee member Jamie Tak spoke to the director.
In the film, Marie speaks of her portraits of others as a ‘self-portrait through the people’. Do you see your portraiture of Marie as a kind of self-portrait? How much of the film is inflected by your own lived experience?
Marie Dvořáková: I wouldn’t call the film a self-portrait. Marie Tomanova’s path and mine are quite different. But in leaving home, building a new life elsewhere, and then returning to the places where you were born and raised — in that, our journeys overlap. By filming Marie’s story and her return home, I was able to relive my own — to close an important chapter of my life and come to terms with it. That’s why World Between Us is both deeply personal and profoundly meaningful to me.
The film is called World Between Us. You have said that this refers to the private worlds shared by Marie and her subjects, you and Marie, Marie and Thomas, and of course, the film and the spectator. Yet the title could also allude to a certain measure of distance between two people. How did you determine your directorial and cinematographic distance from Marie?
Marie Dvořáková: I wanted to create a vivid, cinematic story—not a typical television documentary portrait filled with talking heads. I often reflected on how to approach the filming and what I could do differently. It’s not easy to make a film about someone who feels completely at ease in front of the camera, has a strong social media presence, and is naturally outgoing and open to the world. It was important for me to find a deeper level—to get truly close to Marie and Thomas, to uncover the different layers of their personalities and their relationship, and to strip away any façade. And that takes time. I deliberately filmed Marie in extreme close-ups; I wanted the audience to feel as if they could reach out and touch her.
The film explores the idea of taking root, of being between homes. What does home mean to you, and what is your understanding of the relationship between home and art?
Marie Dvořáková: Home, for me, is where the people I love the most are. I can’t talk about art in an abstract sense, because as a filmmaker, I see myself more as a craftsman. What I admire most about filmmaking — and why I chose this medium — is how deeply it is rooted in craft. You need talent, yes, but you also need to master the craft; otherwise, it shows very quickly.
There’s so much audiovisual content today made by people who clearly don’t understand what they’re doing — and you can’t fake it. It’s like playing the violin: if you don’t know how, everyone will hear it right away. That honesty is what I love most about film.
You have said that World Between Us is a story of the American dream. How do you think this paradigm has changed over time, particularly for migrant creatives?
Marie Dvořáková: I think George Carlin put it best: “They call it the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.” For me, my version of the American dream has always been about work — and that hasn’t changed, and probably never will. You don’t have to be an artist to feel that way; it applies to any profession. The so-called American dream doesn’t really exist, and that’s something I tried to reflect in the film.
You have to learn the language, work incredibly hard, and hope to meet the right people — those willing to take a chance on you, maybe even give you an opportunity over a local. There are so many variables in that equation, and that’s true for migrants anywhere in the world.
But one thing I’ve learned: it’s always easier when you’re not trying to chase that dream alone.
World Between Us screens on Saturday, Oct 18th, 6.30pm at Lido Cinemas, Hawthorn.