I definitely wished I had noticed this I had noticed this film and their Kickstarter campaign earlier than I had, as with only 20 hours remaining to hit their £10k goal (at the time I’m typing this they are on £7613)  im sure these next few hours will be a busy time for the team behind Rozkvet , a film which will take us back into occupied Czechoslovakia, 1943 and tell a story that is not often told, that of the Romani people and their fight for survival during the Second World War.

With production on the film aiming for a July 2024 start date and which will take place across various locations in Northern Ireland, the team are hard at work raising the funds for that production and money donated (as long as they hit their £10k target of course- as with Kickstarter, its an all or nothing campaign) will go towards payment for the cast and crew, hiring of filmmaking equipment, props, costumes, locations as well as set building for the much needed location where the majority of the film will take place.

With information that I have borrowed from their Kickstarter page (which you can find HERE ) one of the questions the team answer is. Why this Story?  Their answer is here

Rozkvet presents a unique opportunity for an authentic portrayal of the Romani/Roma people, who remain underrepresented in mainstream media and, when they are, it is often in a negative light, perpetuating racial stereotypes.

Roma have suffered discrimination and persecution since their arrival in Europe in the Middle Ages. This persecution of Roma reached a peak following the rise of the Nazi party. Romani people in Germany were stripped of their citizenship and as a result were subjected to violence and imprisonment, finally escalating to state-sponsored genocide in extermination camps. As no accurate pre-war census figures exist for the Roma, the actual number of those who were killed in the Romani Holocaust is difficult to assess but estimates range as high as 1.5 million across occupied Europe.

2025 will mark 80 years since the defeat of Nazi Germany and the end of the Second World War in Europe, yet in spite of these horrors, negative stereotypes of Roma as inherently criminal and antisocial persist to this day. Such stereotypes continue to contribute to issues, such as societal ostracism, ethnic tension, widespread poverty and racially motivated murder. Rozkvet aims to bring awareness to these facts and also to examine the root cause of such discrimination. It also draws attention to the fact that those targeted by the Nazis were not simply helpless victims and that many did in fact fight back against their deadly occupation.

Will the team behind Rozkvet hit their much needed £10k target, I do hope so. The only thing that will secure that are donations, so if you can donate- please do, if you cant, then please share the article and campaign page and fingers crossed enough donations will come into their Kickstarter so the team can prepare for filming this Summer.   Wishing them all the very best! You can find their campaign page here.