Letní kino promítá dokumentární film z nového repertoáru.

Letní kino literally means summer cinema, but in practice it usually refers to an open-air cinema or outdoor movie theater, especially one operating in warm weather.

So even though the literal words are simple, the phrase is a set expression in Czech.

• letní = summer
• kino = cinema / movie theater

Letní belongs to a group of adjectives that typically end in -ní or -í, and its nominative singular form is simply letní for all genders.

So you get:

• letní den = a summer day
• letní škola = a summer school
• letní kino = a summer cinema

Unlike adjectives such as nový, which change clearly in the nominative singular (nový / nová / nové), letní stays letní in the basic singular form.

The subject is letní kino.

That is the thing doing the action of promítá.

So the structure is:

• Letní kino = subject
• promítá = verb
• dokumentární film = object
• z nového repertoáru = prepositional phrase describing the film

Promítá means screens, shows, or literally projects.

It comes from the verb promítat, which is commonly used for showing films in a cinema context.

Examples:

• Kino promítá nový film. = The cinema is showing a new film.
• Večer promítají komedii. = They’re showing a comedy in the evening.

In this sentence, promítá is:

• present tense
• 3rd person singular
• from the imperfective verb promítat

So letní kino promítá... = the open-air cinema is showing...

Because film is the direct object of the verb promítá.

The cinema is showing what?
→ dokumentární film

In Czech, the direct object is usually in the accusative case.

Here, though, film is a masculine inanimate noun, and in the singular its nominative and accusative forms are the same:

• nominative: film
• accusative: film

So the case is accusative, even though the form does not change.

Because the normal Czech word order inside a noun phrase is:

adjective + noun

So:

• dokumentární film = documentary film
• nový repertoár = new repertoire
• letní kino = summer/open-air cinema

Putting the adjective after the noun is unusual in ordinary Czech and would sound marked, poetic, or stylistically special.

It is in the genitive, because the preposition z requires the genitive.

So:

• z = from / out of
• z repertoáru = from the repertoire
• z nového repertoáru = from the new repertoire

This is a very common pattern in Czech:

• z domu = from the house
• z Prahy = from Prague
• z nového programu = from the new program

Because both the adjective and the noun must match the case, number, and gender required by z.

Here:

• repertoár is masculine inanimate
• singular
• after z, it must be genitive singular

So:

• nominative: nový repertoár
• genitive: nového repertoáru

Both words change:

• nový → nového
• repertoár → repertoáru

Here repertoár means something like a cinema’s program selection, lineup, or set of films being offered.

So film z nového repertoáru means:

• a film from the new lineup
• a film from the newly introduced program
• a film from the new repertoire

The word repertoár is also used in other contexts, such as theater, music, or performance.

In this sentence, it most naturally describes film.

So the meaning is: The open-air cinema is showing a documentary film from the new repertoire.

Grammatically, Czech often places a phrase like this right after the noun it describes, and that is what is happening here.

If you wanted to say that the cinema itself belongs to some new repertoire, that would be much less natural semantically.

Yes, Czech word order is more flexible than English word order, because case endings show grammatical roles.

For example, you could also say:

• Dokumentární film z nového repertoáru promítá letní kino.

This is still understandable, but the emphasis changes. It sounds more marked and may focus attention on the documentary film first.

The original sentence is the most neutral and straightforward:

• Letní kino promítá dokumentární film z nového repertoáru.

Yes. Czech often uses the simple present where English might use either the simple present or the present progressive.

So promítá can mean:

• shows
• is showing

The exact English translation depends on context.

In schedules, programs, and general descriptions, Czech commonly uses the present tense this way.

No. Czech has no articles.

So dokumentární film can mean:

• a documentary film
• the documentary film

The exact meaning depends on context.

That is why Czech learners coming from English often need to get used to understanding definiteness from the situation rather than from a word like a or the.

It uses the imperfective verb promítat.

That makes sense because the sentence describes an ongoing activity or a general fact about what the cinema is showing.

• promítat = imperfective
• promítnout = perfective

In a sentence like this, imperfective is the natural choice because it presents the action as a process or current event, not as a single completed whole.

For example:

• Kino promítá film. = The cinema is showing a film.
• Kino promítlo film včera večer. = The cinema showed/screened the film yesterday evening.