Michal Pavlíček: Rocker Version 7.0

Director Michal Baumbruk's documentary is not a conventional biographical portrait. As he himself puts it: "Michal Pavlíček is an exceptional creator who has perhaps already said much about himself. Rather than a standard biographical portrait, we offer a unique insight into the situation of a rock star and composer who has just turned seventy. What drives this successful musician, composer and virtuoso, and what limits him? What awaits him at this stage of life? Are creativity, inspiration and the urge to create inexhaustible?"

The film follows Michal through a series of concerts - in Ostrava and Brno, where he returned after surgery on his musculoskeletal system, and on the main stage of the Pohoda festival, where a Prague Selection concert was swept away by a storm shortly after it ended. The camera also accompanies him to a Moravian village, where he plays with a virtuoso on Chinese gongs for a small group of enthusiasts, only to perform that same evening before a packed hall with the Selection in a small town.

A second thread follows the creation of scenic music for a theatre production and for the Czech television series Octopus - here Michal discusses the intimate process of finding motifs and moods, and how he constantly records "terabytes" of music before selecting and finishing the best pieces. A third thread captures the preparation of a new solo album in collaboration with Phil Schoenfeld, a musician who has navigated the New York music and drug scenes - a process full of tension, delays, hesitation and unexpected turns.

Besides Michal Pavlíček, the film features Bára Basiková, Michael Kocáb, Vilém Čok, Jiří Hrubeš, Klaudius Kryšpín, Radim Vizváry and other friends, family members and collaborators.