Slovenian film guide 2026

Cafe Astoria

by Jože Pogačnik

Kavarna Astoria, 1989, fiction, film 35mm, c, 103 min

SI, YU

Finished

The city of Maribor before the Second World War, and Maribor after its liberation mark, the period in which the film Cafe Astoria is set. The story relates with a gentle melancholy and a slight irony the lives of a middle-class family: the cafe owner, his wife and their son. Through their individual destinies we become acquainted with the social and historical background of a by-gone era; the social and national differences of pre-war Maribor, divisions among the wealthy and poor, and nationally minded Slovenes and fanatic Germanophils. The first year after the war introduced the absurd characteristic, cruel measures of the so called revolutionary social transformations in which calamity a…
Jože Pogačnik
Awards
Festival Award Year
17th Slovene Film Week
Metod Badjura Recognition Award (Jury Award), best editing
1989
17th Slovene Film Week
Stop Magazine Award for Best Actor (Jury Award), best actor/actress (Woman)
Stop Magazine Award for Best Actor (Jury Award), best actor/actress (Male)
1989
36th Pula Film Festival
Golden Arena (Jury Award), best leading role (Male)
Golden Arena (Jury Award), best directing
1989
3rd Montenegro Film Festival
Silver Mimosa (Jury Award), best film
1989