Former Nazi Klaus Abard survives to the 1990s by taking anti-aging pills. He plans to use a time travel trip to return to Germany in 1944 and present Hitler with a hydrogen bomb, so that he can win the war. Read More »
Tag Archives: Czech
Stín kapradiny / The Shadow of the Ferns (1984) Frantisek Vlácil, Marek Probosz, Zbigniew Suszynski, Miroslav Machácek, Crime, Drama
Based on the only extensive prose work by the surrealist painter Josef Capek, Shades of Fern most resembles the philosophical fairy tales and fables of Josef’s older brother Read More »
Císaruv pekar a pekaruv císar / The Emperor and the Golem (1952) Martin Fric, Jan Werich, Marie Vásová, Natasa Gollová, Comedy, Fantasy
Rudolph II, the Holy Roman Emperor, does not have a simple life. And yet he manages to complicate it even more with his frequent outbursts of anger. Read More »
Slunce, seno, jahody / Sun, Hay, Strawberries (1984) Zdenek Troska, Pavel Kikincuk, Bronek Cerny, Veronika Kánská, Comedy
A Czech agricultural student, Šimon Pláni?ka, arrives at the small South Bohemian town of Hoštice, and joins the local JZD (agricultural co-op) with the intention of trying out his experiment regarding the “Milk yield of cows in regards to a cultured environment”. Read More »
Tmavomodrý svet / Dark Blue World (2001) Jan Sverák, Ondrej Vetchý, Krystof Hádek, Tara Fitzgerald, War, Drama, Action
March 15, 1939: Germany invades Czechoslovakia. Czech and Slovak pilots flee to England, joining the RAF. Read More »
Probudím se vcera / I Wake Up Yesterday (2012) Milos Smídmajer, Jirí Mádl, Filip Blazek, Eva Josefíková, Comedy, Sci-Fi
This quirky student comedy tells the story of Petr Kovár (Filip Blazek), who gets the chance to return to the past for a while and he meets the love of his life, his classmate Eliska, again in June 1989. There is one hook: physically he is seventeen again (played by Jirí Mádl), but his mind remains that of a modern “forty-something”.
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Podobizna (1948) Jirí Slavícek, Otomar Krejca, Ljuba Skorepová, Vladimír Smeral, Drama, Horror
People are afraid of the usurer Chazaj and are convinced that he is the bearer of evil. One day Chazaj pays a visit to the poor artist Simon Jordán and asks him to paint his portrait. Simon agrees but as he progresses with the work his mind conjures up terrible thoughts and in the end he commits suicide.
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Telo bez duse / Body Without Soul (1996) Wiktor Grodecki, Documentary
Documentary look at doomed male prostitutes in Prague, ages 15 to 18, who troll at the public swimming pool, the train station, a video arcade, and a disco. After the boys talk about how they got in the game, the camera follows them to the home of Pavel Rousek. Under the name Hans Miller, he makes gay porno videos, primarily for German distribution. Intercut with a movie shoot chez Rousek is an interview that follows him to his day job at a morgue, where he performs an autopsy as he talks about his work. The sex is without protection; the boys are without family. They talk about their bodies and souls, money, their sexual orientation, AIDS, their dreams, and death.
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Loves of a Blonde / Lásky jedné plavovlásky (1965) Milos Forman, Hana Brejchová, Vladimír Pucholt, Vladimír Mensík, Comedy, Romance, Drama
A factory manager in rural Czechoslovakia bargains with the army to send men to the area, to boost the morale of his young female workers, deprived of male company since the local boys have been conscripted. The army sends reservists, mostly married middle-aged men – and the local beauty Andula, spurns those bold enough to try to win her, for the jazz pianist, newly come from Prague to perform. He seduces her and impresses her, telling her “most women are round, like guitars but you are a guitar by Picasso”. Staying the night with him causes a lecture on a young woman’s honour at her hostel so she throws over her other suitors and makes her way to Prague to find the young man. His protective Mamma and weary Pappa are not pleased when she arrives on the doorstep with her suitcase.
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Happy End (1967) Oldrich Lipský, Vladimír Mensík, Jaroslava Obermaierová, Josef Abrhám, Comedy, Crime
A dark comedy about a murder and its consequences presented in a backwards manner, where death is actually a rebirth. The film starts with an “execution” of the main protagonist and goes back to explore his previous actions and motivations.
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Poslední motýl / The Last Butterfly (1991) Karel Kachyna, Tom Courtenay, Brigitte Fossey, Ingrid Held, Drama, War
Stage mime Antoine Moreau (Tom Courtenay) is compelled by the Gestapo to put on a performance for the children of Terezin, a “model” concentration camp, to convince the Red Cross observers that the camp is truly what it seems. Reluctant at first, Moreau slowly learns the true nature of the camp, including the meaning of the “transports” on which people leave. With a world-class orchestra (made up of people interned in the camp) and a cast of children, Moreau stages a show to end all shows.
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Vrazda po nasem / Murder Czech Style (1967) Jirí Weiss, Rudolf Hrusínský, Kveta Fialová, Václav Voska, Comedy, Crime
The protagonist (Rudolf Hrusinsky) is a dull, fat, shy government clerk indulging in voyuerism and ego fantasies. In love with another clerk (Kveta Fiolova), he is urged on in his pursuit by a commiserate executive. The story is told in a flashback sequence as the cuckolded Hrusinsky attempts suicide by gassing himself in his bathtub. The “Murder” of the title is not a murder as such, rather the murder that Hrusinsky remembers planning upon discovering his wife’s unfaithfulness with his supposed friend and advisor. Both plots failing in his mind, he loses himself in fantastic reveries of his funeral and of hypocritical mourners. ‘ Deciding (perhaps) that this is not the way out either, he gives up the attempt and imagines a life of reconciliation and eventual affluence.
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Katka (2010) Helena Trestíková, Documentary, Biography, Drama
Helena Trestikova is the author of 10 episodes from the series Women on the Brink of the New Millennium, intimate portraits of both successful women and women on the social periphery. The tragic story of a girl named Katka who believes that joy and happiness can be applied through a hypodermic needle. All she is left with is despair. We first meet Katka at a rehab clinic in Nemcice, still full of optimism and faith in a drug-free future. The film tries to draw attention to the drug problem from a somewhat different point of view.
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Zabitá nedele / Squandered Sunday (1969) Drahomíra Vihanová, Irena Boleslavská, Vladislav Drazdák, Alexandra Haskovcová, Drama
It’s Sunday morning. The church bells call people to the Mass, but the army officer Arnost is still sleeping in his austere and shabby room in the barracks. He wakes slowly, and attunes himself step by step to the world and what to do this arid Sunday. He loads his pistol and puts it to his head and in his mouth, without firing it off. While he turns around, he is now and then interrupted by short flashbacks in his memory of situations with frivolous women and much drinking, as well as some daydreams about enforced weddings. He has a relationship with three blond women. Two of them are adult. One is willowy and a bit aloof, the other voluptuous and possessive. The third is a little girl, who he likes to talk with. He goes to the gatekeeper of the barracks, and starts a chat. Through a spyglass he suddenly sees two young women sunbathing topless. As it is within the military area, he orders the gatekeeper to arrest them. The women don’t take him seriously, but he writes a report.
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Smejdi / Crooks (2013) Silvie Dymáková, Roman Vanek, Ondrej Vetchý, Documentary
Silvie Dymáková’s raw documentary uncovers the manipulation, humiliation and pressure that exist behind the closed doors of “product demonstration excursions for seniors” in the Czech Republic. The sad heroes of her film show us the non-functional saucepans, unused vacuum cleaners, “wool” blankets and bio-lamps they bought during such excursions for tens or even hundreds of thousands of crowns… and that is the best-case scenario. In exchange for their ID cards, confiscated by sellers, many have signed loan contracts. Despite their shocking experiences, the elderly repeatedly take part in these events in a bid to escape their loneliness or because they can’t say no to the offers. Dymáková succeeded in smuggling a hidden camera into product presentations and, with a psychologist and a lawyer, analyzed the high-pressure methods employed. Even while being completed, her documentary sparked a deserved uproar when it became clear that dozens of Czech firms were abusing seniors’ …
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