Trupa Trupa’s music is part of Agnieszka Holland’s new film FRANZ.
“Trupa Trupa – the beauty of dark energy. Kafka would have loved them!” – Agnieszka Holland
Producer’s materials
In Agnieszka Holland’s new film “Franz”, which will have its world premiere on September 5 at the 50th Toronto International Film Festival, we will hear music by the band Trupa Trupa. This marks another collaboration between the director and the musicians — their song “Headache” was previously featured in her award-winning film “Green Border”, which drew more than 770,000 viewers in Polish cinemas. “I love Trupa Trupa and Grzegorz as a poet. Their music expresses the kind of energy and freedom I look for in cinema. They are one of the best Polish bands, appreciated also internationally. Kafka would have loved them.” – Agnieszka Holland.
Trupa Trupa is a band from Gdańsk, Poland, formed by Grzegorz Kwiatkowski, Wojtek Juchniewicz and Tomek Pawluczuk. Their music blends post-punk, psychedelia and alternative rock. They have released highly acclaimed albums including “Of the Sun” (2019), “B Flat A” (2022) and “Mourners” (2025), the latest produced by legendary Nick Launay — known for his work with Nick Cave, Amyl and the Sniffers and Idles. The band has recorded three sessions for the BBC, appeared on NPR’s iconic Tiny Desk and World Cafe, and performed at major festivals such as Primavera, SXSW, Iceland Airwaves and Desert Daze. They tour worldwide and receive excellent international press. The Los Angeles Times called them “one of the best rock bands doing business now,” Pitchfork wrote that “Trupa Trupa bring poetry and subtlety to psychedelic rock,” and The Guardian highlighted “their blend of off-kilter melodies, dense instrumentation and lyrical explorations of the darkest side of the human condition.” Their fans include Iggy Pop and Henry Rollins.
Award-winning director Agnieszka Holland is embarking on her most ambitious project to date, a biopic of the iconic 20th-century Czech writer Franz Kafka. Conceived as a kaleidoscopic mosaic, the film will follow the imprint Kafka left on the world from his birth in 19th-century Prague to his death in post-WWI Berlin. FRANZ will give the audience a brand new perspective on the life of the man behind the literary giant. A compelling story inspired by the life, work and imagination of author Franz Kafka, who was fascinatingly ahead of his time. A vegetarian, a workaholic, an introvert, an outsider, a lover through letters and a clerk locked in a nightmare. The film Franz is filled with imagination, humour, pain and the inner world of a man who in his writings defined modern existential angst and who – even a century after his death – remains a mirror of our innermost fears and desires. Director Agnieszka Holland composes a kaleidoscope of events from fragments, dreams, letters and surviving stories. What emerges is a sensually intense portrait of someone who never stopped trying to find himself – and so touched something essential in all of us. The film opens with Kafka’s childhood in Prague and traces his life right up to his death in Austria after WWI. Taking in everything from his relationship with his authoritarian father to his firm friendship with Max Brod and complicated love affairs with Felice Bauer and Milena Jesenska, the film delivers a rich, emotional, often ironic and occasionally grotesque fresco of a man who in his desire for an “ordinary” life succeeded in writing the most extraordinary works.
Genre: biopic/drama
Production: Czech Republic/Germany/Poland 2025
Director: Agnieszka Holland
Screenplay: Marek Epstein
Cast: Idan Weiss, Carol Schuler, Gesa Shermuly, Sebastian Schwarz, Peter Kurth, Sandra Korzeniak, Katharina Stark, Jenovefa Bokova
