The Prague film school

The beginning of the emergence of the Praška škola came in 1968, when Grlić, as a student, directed his first professional television documentary entitled Mi iz Praga (Us from Prague).[8] The film, produced by TV Zagreb, focused on the interactions between the Yugoslav students in Prague. In this film, Marković states it was him and Karanović that had enrolled first in FAMU, prompting the others to follow in their steps.[9] The first feature film directed by a Praška škola member was Zafranović's Sunday (Serbo-Croatian: Nedjelja) (1969), starring Goran Marković,[10] followed by Karanović's Društvena igra (1972) and Grlić's Whichever Way the Ball Bounces (Serbo-Croatian: Kud puklo da puklo) (1974), which were praised by the modernism-influenced film critics, but not yet universally accepted by the wider Yugoslav audience.

However, the second half of the 1970s brought fame to the members of the group, and the term Praška škola was coined by critics after the success of its members at several Yugoslav and international film festivals. In 1976, the TV series Grlom u jagode, written by Grlić and Karanović and directed by Karanović, was highly successful in Yugoslavia. The same year, Paskaljević received the Golden Arena for Best Director award at the Pula Film Festival for his first feature film Beach Guard in Winter (Serbo-Croatian: Čuvar plaže u zimskom periodu). In 1977, Marković's debut film Special Education (Serbo-Croatian: Specijalno vaspitanje) won the FIPRESCI award at the International Filmfestival Mannheim-Heidelberg. In 1978, all four main prizes at the Pula Film Festival were awarded to films directed by former FAMU students: Zafranović's Occupation in 26 Pictures (Serbo-Croatian: Okupacija u 26 slika), Grlić's Bravo maestro, Paskaljević's The Dog Who Loved Trains (Serbo-Croatian: Pas koji je volio vozove), and Karanović's Miris poljskog cveća, for which Živko Zalar was also awarded the Golden Arena for Best Cinematography.

Throughout the 1980s, the term Praška škola was associated with many successful films, popular with critics, as well as the general public. Seven out of ten Golden Arena for Best Director awards from 1976 to 1986 went to the Praška škola, with each member except for Marković receiving at least one. The success of two-time Palme d'Or winner Emir Kusturica, who attended FAMU several years after the other members of the Praška škola, further boosted the academy's reputation in field of Yugoslav cinema.

The legitimacy of the term Praška škola is sometimes doubted, as the members themselves never used the term to describe their work, and their work varied in artistic sensibility and directorial approach, sometimes considerably.[3] In 1990, Marković wrote a book entitled Češka škola ne postoji (The Czech School Doesn't Exist), in which he describes his days at FAMU, his relationships with the other students and their artistic similarities and differences.[2] In a 2001 interview, Karanović expressed strong opposition to the term, saying:

"I think that everyone got extremely bored of the term Praška škola quite a while ago. I cannot deny that I studied in Prague, that I learned a lot — yet, not everything — there, and that I made lasting friendships with my colleagues from former Yugoslavia who studied there at the same time. Yet, I reckon that we are all very different artists and only in some of our films can one find some hints of influence from 1960s Czech cinematography. I appreciate the films by Rajko Grlić, Goran Marković, Goran Paskaljević, Lordan Zafranović and Emir Kusturica very much, but I think that all of them deserve to be observed individually, and not as a part of this or any other group."[11]

However, retrospectives of the Praška škola were held in Belgrade in 2001,[11] and in Zagreb in 2014, when all the initial Praška škola members, except for Karanović, met and reminisced about their Prague years.[1][12] In August 2014, Zafranović, Marković, Paskaljević and Grlić announced they would be filming together for the first time. Grlić and Marković said that an anthology film with the working title Nirvana was to be filmed in the memory of their professor Elmar Klos.[7][13] However, this film never came to fruition. In September 2018, a program dedicated to the Praška škola entitled Mi iz Praga 1968.-2018. was held in Rijeka, and Paskaljević, Karanović, Zafranović and Grlić joined a panel discussion.

As of 2022, all the founding members of Praška škola are still alive and active, except for Goran Paskaljević, who died on 25 September 2020.

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  Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (FAMU)
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  FAMU professor Elmar Klos
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  Lordan Zafranović
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  Goran Marković
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  Goran Paskaljević
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  Rajko Grlić
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  Emir Kusturica
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  Vilko Filač
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  Valentin Perko

• Ivan Velisavljević: Autorske poetike reditelja „Praške grupe“ jugoslovenskog filma (in Serbian)