From the behavior, discourse, and appearance of individual actors, Vachek composes, in the form of a mosaic, a broad and many-layered film-argument about Czechoslovak democracy in the period of its rebirth, all administered with the director’s inimitable point of view.
A story of a young student of medicine, who arrives in a small mountain village after being accused for carrying out illegal abortion. The film reflects the moral decline of the society, where stealing in secret and making compromises against one's beliefs make up mundane reality. The filmmakers...
The dramatic story of Karel Svozil, an aging professor of art history, tells of love and old age, illness, death and the worries of everyday life with a humorous touch. A diagnosis of a cancerous tumour unexpectedly interferes with the life of the wise and sophisticated man and his love affair with...
The story of 1947, when Bender's band, after a beating of the Nazis, tried to fight their way through Czechoslovakia to Austria. They come out of the forest to occupy the family's rural estate, kidnap doctors to help heal one of their wounded.
In 1947 by the Beskid mountains, the traces of war still linger, destroyed tanks dispersed throughout the farmland creating an eerie backdrop. This film follows a ten-year-old boy and the strange visions he encounters, his world of fantasy exacerbated with ample time, space, and a lack of...
On a walk through Prague, a 40-year-old son's conversations with his septuagenarian father reveal complexities that both strain and sustain their bond.
The psychological story of a young top athlete - hockey player, showing the downside of the all-round care that top athletes enjoy. On the one hand, there are the exceptionally favourable living conditions, but on the other, human envy, the fickleness of the public's favour, gossip, bribery and...
Set against the majestic mountains of central Slovakia, first time director Vladimir Balko explores the difficulties and challenges one former inmate must face upon his release from prison. Tono has just been released after a five-year stint in prison for lumber theft. Although attempting to stay...
The trenches of World War I provide for a captivating backdrop to the drama of Corporal Hoferik. In his devotion to the Habsburg Monarchy, he fanatically carries out his military orders, but he ultimately suffers the Empire's disfavor.
The story takes place in a metallurgical plant where important technological changes are being made while the plant is in full operation. However, a mistake in the project puts the entire plant at risk, as a gas explosion threatens. All the workers then forget about any potential rifts and join...
In the bleak autumn mountains of the Beskydy Mountains, a dramatic story set in the wartime November 1944 takes place. Seven refugees join forces with partisans, but during a joint sabotage operation - blowing up a bridge - they discover they have a traitor in their midst. Brought to the mountains...
A young man has led his whole life with his grandfather. When he was in school, he was the only one who was refused to join the Youth Brigade, since his father was sentenced to death for spying. When it is time for him to do the compulsory military service, he has to do it in a platoon for...
Placek (Josef Kemr), the head of research in a chemical plant, appreciates the help of his younger colleague Bernát (Alois Svehlík) in the creation of a new synthetic material.
A tragicomedy set in a village where it depicts a diverse assemblage of old geezers spending the autumn of their lives in different ways. Some are amused by watching cars speeding around an obscure bend, but one agonises over both humiliating poverty (his pension is barely enough to buy the most...
