Actualités

Czech writer-director Jiří Weiss’s The Golden Fern is a dark and haunting fairy tale, albeit one that’s grounded in an earthy naturalism. Rather than lean heavily into the surreal, as these films often do, Weiss subtly weaves elements of the magical or miraculous into an otherwise straightforward narrative, thereby cannily introducing aspects of the uncanny. As for the moral lessons implicit in the story, The Golden Fern touches on weighty themes of arrogance, ingratitude, and infidelity.

A narrator informs us that The Golden Fern begins very precisely on Saint John’s Eve, a feast day associated with Midsummer and the summer solstice. The occasion is often associated with the gathering of wild plants, and that’s how we meet Jura (Vit Olmer), a shepherd working his way through the dark woods until he encounters the titular vegetation. We’re never told precisely what the properties of the fern are,...