Private Project

The Future Shapes the Past: The Hilsner Case

In 1899, the murder of a young woman in the woods of Bohemia sparked a blood libel that still haunts the Czech Republic today. Leopold Hilsner, the Jewish man wrongly accused, remains legally guilty, despite activists fighting to overturn the verdict for more than 30 years.

  • Bryan Richard Felber
    Director
  • Bryan Richard Felber
    Writer
  • Bryan Richard Felber
    Producer
  • Jan Prchal
    Key Cast
    "Himself"
  • Hillel Kieval
    Key Cast
    "Himself"
  • Charles Heller
    Key Cast
    "Himself"
  • Petr VašÍček
    Key Cast
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Feature
  • Runtime:
    1 hour 18 minutes 41 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    November 15, 2025
  • Country of Origin:
    United States
  • Country of Filming:
    Canada, Germany, United States
  • Language:
    Czech, English
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital, 4k
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Digital Cinema Package:
    Unavailable
  • Polná World Premiere
    Polná
    Czechia
    November 15, 2025
    World Premiere
  • Santa Clarita International Film Festival
    Los Angeles
    December 14, 2025
    North American Premiere
    Best Documentary Feature
  • Prague - Kino Světozor
    Prague
    Czechia
    January 26, 2026
    Prague Premiere
  • Brno - Kino Art
    Brno
    Czechia
    January 27, 2026
    Brno Premiere
  • Golden State Film Festival
    Los Angeles
    United States
    March 1, 2026
    Official Selection
Director Biography - Bryan Richard Felber

Bryan Felber is an American filmmaker whose work explores the intersection of history, culture, and present-day politics. He holds a BFA from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (2012) and studied directing and cinematography at FAMU in Prague (2011). He won first place at the Trinity College Film Festival for his short film University of the Streets (2012) and has worked in post-production on series including America’s Got Talent and American Alchemy. The Future Shapes the Past is his debut feature-length documentary. Since its completion in November 2025, the film has had a sold-out world premiere in Polná, the Czech Republic, won Best Documentary at the 2025 Santa Clarita International Film Festival, and is scheduled to premiere in a shortened broadcast version on Czech Television in 2026.

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

As an American expat who was living in Prague between 2020 and 2023, I decided to turn my lens on the lesser-known parts of Czech-Jewish history. I wanted to know what Jewish life was like in Prague before the Holocaust. One story that kept coming up was the Hilsner Affair.

The Hilsner Affair of 1899–1900 was a famous series of trials in Bohemia in which a Jewish man, Leopold Hilsner, was charged with having participated in a ritual murder. The accusation was widely publicized and detailed in the antisemitic press, and Hilsner was sentenced to life imprisonment but pardoned after spending 18 years in prison.

Growing up in a Jewish family, I had never heard of the blood libel, the medieval myth that claimed Jews used Christian blood in Passover matzah. To me, it was shocking how politicians were able to stoke populist sentiment with such a widely believed conspiracy theory.

But the craziest part?

This conviction is still on the legal record despite activists, journalists, and lawyers pushing for its removal since 1996.

While making this film, I realized that the divisive ethnic and national tensions of the turn of the 20th century are still at play today, and as the late poet Michael March said, “the future is shaping the past.”