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The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival kicks off on Friday night in the West Bohemian spa town. This year’s festival, the 48th, will give audiences the chance to catch hundreds of movies they would never otherwise get to see on the big screen, while fans can also look forward to seeing some big stars on the red carpet. Ahead of the gala opening, Ian Willoughby, who is there, told us what is happening at the moment.

Vojtech Jasný’s lyrical masterpiece All My Good Countrymen is the third classic Czech film to have been digitally restored in recent years, and, like its predecessors, the new version will be seen for the first time at the Karlovy Vary film festival. Ahead of Saturday’s gala screening, I discussed the movie and its restoration with the person who oversaw the project, Anna Batistová, head of the Audiovisual Collection at the National Film Archive.

The Slovak-born billionaire Andrej Babiš made a major acquisition on the Czech media market this week – buying the Mafra publishing house that prints two of the country’s biggest dailies, Mladá Fronta Dnes and Lidové Noviny. The move still needs to be approved by the country’s anti-trust office, but if given the green light, marks a significant step forward for Mr Babiš – who has political ambitions too.

A ceremony was held on Wednesday at Prague's Ďáblice Cemetery to remember those killed or incarcerated by Czechoslovakia's communist regime. Organised by the Confederation of Former Political Prisoners, it was attended by a number of political and religious leaders, who warned that many Czechs were succumbing to a dangerous form of political amnesia.

Former coalition parties and the opposition have expressed their strong disapproval of the naming of a caretaker prime minister by the president. No parliamentary party has expressed support for the new Prime Minister Jiří Rusnok, whose future cabinet is already running the risk of not getting enough votes in parliament to confirm their position

This year’s Stanley Cup Final between the Chicago Blackhawks and the Boston Bruins was an epic and tightly-fought affair, with the Bruins – including future hall-of famer Jaromír Jágr – needing to win on Monday to force a deciding Game 7. It didn’t happen: with less than two minutes remaining on the clock, the Blackhawks scored not once but twice – a one-two punch from which the Bruins couldn’t recover.

President Zeman’s decision to replace the outgoing centre-right government with a caretaker administration until scheduled or early elections has evoked an outcry on the Czech political scene, with many accusing the head of state of wanting to usurp more powers than he rightly has under the Czech Constitution. So is Mr. Zeman carving out a semi-presidential system for himself, as some foreign media suggest? A question Radio Prague put to political analyst Jiři Pehe.

In an exclusive interview for Czech Radio on Sunday President Milos Zeman unveiled his position with regard to the ongoing political crisis. Following separate talks with the leaders of all parliamentary parties, the president indicated that he would not allow the centre-right coalition to continue in office and would take steps to appoint an interim government to run the country until scheduled or early elections.

Earlier this week, the country’s president, Miloš Zeman, suggested that early elections would be the more expensive option out of the current government crisis, costing around 500 million crowns and sweeping key legislation off the table. So far, it appears his words had little effect. A new poll commissioned by Czech Radio, suggests that early elections – as a way forward – are favoured by a majority of Czechs.

In a surprise move, the Civic Democratic Party on Wednesday proposed the speaker of the lower house Miroslava Němcová as the country’s next prime minister. The choice of a woman to head the cabinet has been hailed as a smart move by commentators, but the response of the party’s coalition partners has been lukewarm and Ms. Němcová’s nomination for prime minister designate is in the hands of President Miloš Zeman, who has given no indication that he wants the present coalition to continue in office.