Klára Tasovská’s documentary I’m Not Everything I Want to Be chosen as Czech entry for Oscar 2025

I’m Not Everything I Want to Be is a documentary film from the Czech Republic that is directed by Klára Tasovská, who has written it with Alexander Kashcheev. Tasovská has also produced it with Lukáš Kokeš. Here's the official synopsis as per Letterboxd,

After the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, Libuše Jarcovjáková, a young female photographer, strives to break free from the constraints of Czechoslovak normalization and embarks on a wild journey towards freedom, capturing her experiences on thousands of subjective photographs.

The film has been nominated by the Czech Republic as its entry for the 2025 Academy Awards.

I’m Not Everything I Want to Be is Czech's entry for Oscar 2025

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I’m Not Everything I Want to Be has been submitted by the Czech Republic in the Best International Feature category for the 98th Academy Awards. It has been selected by the country's Film and Television Academy. It focuses on educator and photographer Libuše Jarcovjáková, who had photographed and documented the nightlife of people from the marginalized community in the 1970s-80s of Prague. She then moved out of her country and shifted to West Berlin. The maker uses her personal diary and pictures to make a complete portrait of her life.

I’m Not Everything I Want to Be had its world premiere at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival. It has also been screened at the 2024 Festival du nouveau cinéma, where it was awarded the Fierté Montréal award for best LGBTQ-related content as well as the Daniel Langlois Innovation Award. It was also honored at Lyon's 2025 LGBTQ+ festival with the Pass Culture jury prize as well as the audience award. Besides these awards, it was also bestowed with the Czech Lion for best documentary.

I’m Not Everything I Want to Be was selected from the list of titles like Caravan and Broken Voices. On December 16, the Academy body will be announcing the full list of 15 titles shortlisted in the International Features. The event will take place in Los Angeles, California, on March 15, 2026.

It is the first instance of the country selecting the title through a process of two rounds. The film is edited by Alexander Kashcheev, while Oliver Torr, Prokop Korb and Adam Matej have composed the music.

In a DAE interview, I’m Not Everything I Want to Be director Klára Tasovská spoke about how the idea of making it started during the 2020 pandemic.

"...since Libuše [Jarcovjáková] was stuck at home (during pandemic), she started scanning some negatives from her time in Japan, going through these photos for the first time forty years after first taking them. She was also discovering, or re-discovering, some of her own work. She photographed everything in her life along with all these self-portraits, as well as the diaries she’s kept her entire life. I saw this very complex story in these materials almost immediately and decided that this film would consist only of this personal archive."

What are your thoughts on the film's Oscar selection?