Valerie and Her Week of Wonders

1970, Jaromil Jires, a short piece that is genuinely off-beat
images with either little contrast, then a surprise
or with overexposure and white lighting
this is pretty much the cliche of 'dreamlike'; add to that the shades used
the camera is watching, rather than concentrating on the affect though (rather underplayed, if anything, at times)
seeing Valerie through thickets between her and the lens, and then seeing her perception view
it decenters the character of Valerie herself
add to this the high-angle (among other dramatic angles); not classic 'dreamworld' stuff
the piece is generally a calm fantasia, perhaps in her dreams, symbolising her growth
it can come on a bit like a random melange, a coherent (associative) narrative could perhaps be cut through it
quite short takes mean this really isn't an actors piece, nor is there any kind of drive
a curio rather than anything particularly brilliant

Stiny Horkeho Leta (Shadows Of A Hot Summer)

Our old friend Frantisek Vlacil, in 1978, one of his final films. Also, one of his best.
We have some good identification with our central character, and we have fascinating themes of just how much one can take ('Hana-Bi' as the master of this theme, but we have a slightly different angle in this good but lesser film). The use of early scenes to build this theme, and the reaction of the character of the son, initially angry and confused, then finding out he is weak and accepting, is a fascinating dialectic. The ending is of course overheated, if still very interesting theoretically, with one rather major plot hole that we'll let Vlacil get away with. The plot generally is interesting and not taken as secondary; Vlacil has learnt how to tell a good stroy, and it is genuinely tense as we build up.
Formally it is a good even mixture of Vlacil's more usual shots with some nice wide ones of the hot, hot summer. He shoots the action well in a deadpan manner. The rather jarring jabs when quick moments of shots and jolts occur is still rather dated, but less so than in some of Vlacil's earlier works.
Vlacil, in his later work, seems to have focussed more on narrative. He learns to build up tensions but getting nicely inexpressive smouldering out of his actors, and does not have the formal trickery in so far as huge faces and psychoanalytic 'complexity' that could make his earlier work grate slightly.
An interesting director, one of his better films, recommended of one has enjoyed any other pieces of Vlacil's work.

Dym Bramborove Nate (Smoke On The Potato Fields)

1977 film from our good friend Frantisek Vlacil. And this is one of his better ones.
We have the doctor, who is our centre, smartly identified. He is not let to dominate the screen, but appears at the edges constantly. It is as though there is an absence where the central identification should be; in the meantime, we shall follow this lonley and tired man.
In so far as shots, we have the interesting initial one, and others follow, of the male and female looking in opposite directions, trying to be together but ultimately failing. Vlacil is not so keen to make icons of his large character's faces as he was at the start of his career. He is able to ease back, even to on occassion go for the wide, still shots of landscape he seemed to shy away from earlier.
As for the plot, the dilemna of the central character is nicely, understatedly played. We do not dwell on what he is doing or why, rather it is a wonderfully acted character study in restraint and resignation. The real excercise here is in how the man adapts to an enviroment that is depicted better than ever. The old instruments, the stilted attitidues. Very well done.
One does rather tire of this film, the plot, for the last third, is difficult not to lose a bit of interest in. The place is curious to see, but it would be wrong to say that Vlacil has ever made the places he shoots beautiful.
One of Vlacil's better works, if not great.

Marketa Lazarova

Frantisek Vlacil in 1967, this is known as the consumation of his art, voted rather recently the greatest Czech film of all time.
An epic it is and an epic it is. In an expressionist, non linear way we have the histories of the two tribes. There are obvious parralels running through it, with the character (who doesn't appear for large stretches) of Marketa herself perhaps representing in some sense the Czech country and people. The rather worrying aquiescene of her, a kind of fatalism surrounding it, shows a country at the mercy of persecution and hardship.
Let's get the negatives sorted out first. This film is, frankly, very hard to concentrate on throughout. The story is 'told' in such a fashion, of jumps and expressionist cuts, that one isn't sure where one is. This destroys a sense of build up, of mounting tension. Constantly switching which character we follow dissapates the tension. It is a film lacking continuity. Vlacil has also never quite succeeded in capturing the images he wants. He doesn't appear to have quite the patience, will, or love of his landscape. He retreats to hand held or to moving, fast swishes , when a more baroque setting would have given us a sense of calm this piece lacks. Finally, the expressionist montage is frankly baffling for large parts. The script (a bad translation) appears to be a collection of slightly pretentious non sequiters.
This is a film of a certain grandeur, however, largely through a hardline brutalism and well conjectured themes. We really have a sense of the violence that is at once casual and still aching on those who give and recieve. No redemption, no classic narrative tie-ups, just a sense of life at its worst. And though we do not belive Vlacil captures it to its best, the widescreen evocations of the fields, the snow, and the landscape always stun as the frame in their open ended way. Their is some nice fun with contrast, leading to some images (the white snow against the dark sky) that give the appropriately apocalyptic images.
This is a film of fragments, which requires much patience in its build up, but does achieve a kind of twisted power. Far far from being perfect, with many faults, it is still a film that intrigues.

Valley Of The Bees

Catching up with our mate Frantisek, it's 1968. Here's he's made his film about religion.
Deal with the visuals; a few bits of fun with contrast, blinding overexposure, a bit of underexposure on the castle. Atmosheric, not much continuity. He has toned down the huge faces, but still likes his close ups. He does not so much dwell on the landscapes, this film was shot in Acadmey ration unlike the squarer formats of the others, it makes little difference. He's coming to like nature, but it's a slow process.
In this film Frantisek does well to tease out the complex thematics of the metaphors of dogs and bees that swarm, that sting and kill in order. We wonder whether the castle life is really any different, in that it mirrors these enviroments and that of the knights. Questions of how to follow a religion are posed, we have sense of a genuine internal conflict even if we are not particularly let in.
The narrative follows intermittently, sometimes we are unsure which perspective we are really getting. This keeps us off balance, but also leads to a film that rather meanders.
Not the best, neither the worst, Vlacil. Occassionally a little tiresome, it nevertheless feels quite worthwhile. A bit of a 'meh' piece.

Adelheid

Frantisek Vlacil, 1970 when he made this post-WW2 movie.
We think that this is not far off from being a very good film, but it probably pans out as average at best.
Vlacil seems to have decided to stop directing, he does not use his trademark closep ups, and only rarely does the looking up at the face thing. There is quite lot of most un-Vlacil like wide shots of people looking a bit lost in rooms.
The film is edited absolutely atrociously, it jars grimly. The acting doesn't intrude on our suspension of disbelief, but it also fails to take us anywhere. The speed this film goes at is mournful, and the colour scheme doesn't help.
The reason this film could have been very good (and in parts almost is) are two; firstly, the story is excellent. It would have benefitted from a bit of self-consciousness, a bit of Poe-esque hysteria around the house (which we never bloody well leave) but there are great psychosexual, fetishistic, and post-war reconcilliation things going on here. The nature of desire and that coming against the harsh realities of empirical war.
Secondly, in this film Vlacil is excellent in the small things. He does his identification and P.O.V. shots neatly, he is smart around the objects. Funny little things at the side, the painting and the cognac and the final scenes, are done with a great variety and lightness of touch.
This film could be really terrific with a remake. Not that the failure is Vlacil's fault; it just seems there was something off about the production. An oxymoron, an intriguing bore.

Dablova Past (The Devil's Trap)

It's 1962 when we again meet Frantisek Vlacil, and he has improved markedly from the rather pretentious 'The White Dove' (though we were worried after seeing the terrible short 'Sklenena Oblaka' ('Clouds of Glass') that he made in 1957).
This is an odd film, with changes of tone and mysteries of the supernatural that made us almost think back to, don't laugh now, the seminal Hollywood B-Movie 'Kiss Me Deadly'.
At the opening we have our usual Vlacil tropes, retained throughout, of the human face superenlarged until it takes up almost the whole screen. This kind of iconicalism and humanism, emphasised further by the camera that looks up and the sharp contrasts with sidelight that brings out pores and hair, is almost Soviet. That is Vlacil's style.
The happy thing here is that he has been reined in by someone else's script, so is forced to tell a story. Through some nice P.O.V., repition, and focus on objects he well conveys and atmosphere of uneven menace. The slightly weird tone, not sure where we are standing, is very affective. He usually keeps it interesting, though you can almost here him tearing at his harnesses in an attempt to ditch the story and become boring.
For the story itself we start off with a familiar rustic tale, yet theological elements unexplained (even at the end, really) are present. As we have some great scenes among the exposition, we start asking ourself who the 'devil' here really is. Vlacil doesn't have a big reveal; what the church insists may, all along, still be right.
The story goes completely nuts towards the end, while at the same time inserting a conventional and fitfully interesting romance. There are some interesting theologies in here too, though articulating them in the clear light of the outside may lead to nonsense.
Still, during the runtime we rather enjoyed the intelligence and atmosphere. Much much better, quite a decent film, all told.

Closely Observed Trains

Jiri Menzel's 1966 movie, a key part of Czech film history, is a delight to watch at times.
It tells a story lightly, personally, with hardcore characterisation through P.O.V. and close shots from the very start. Menzel likes his wide angles too, so for all the fast, fresh cuts we also have a nice reliance on the horizontal train image.
The light is natural and well evokes the waiting, half life of the characters who have this small existence in the middle of a big situation.
Menzel's punturing of the little beliefs, while at once emphasising how important they are, gives a great concluding bite to a film that could otherwise be condemned (or rather, slightly dismissed) as a little light. An excellent little bit of filmaking, not meant in the patronising sense.

Holubice (The White Dove)

1960, Frantisek Vlacil's first film as director. There are a lot of rookie mistakes and annopyances, it isn't the greatest watch ever, but there's enough here to get us excited about a future career.
The manin problem is the plot or rather the lack of it. It is a very short film but still seems rather long, what movement there is is rather ponderous and telegraphs. The metaphors and allusions are fair enough, nice and ambitious, but come at you with something approaching the subtedly of a chainsaw to the face. It appears a bit portentous and, dare we say it, pretentious.
Where this film does point to better things is in the extremely distinctive visual element. We have wonderful differing uses of contrast, the simple black and whites, with few in between (caused by the mis-en-scene the longer exposures, the 'straighter' lighting) of the city, causing nice strong contasts of stubble etc, is nicely set with the manifold greys and side lit textures of the seaside. Scale is also nicely played with in the liftshaft, and in the way our people are at once humbled by monumental, vertical camerawork, while at once this is obviously a humanist filmaker in his almost Soviet focus on dignity and the momentous human face.
If Vlacil learns to use these images better, we're in a for a treat. This particular film though doesn't quite work, as the delivery is mawkish however much sincere truth there may be in the faceless child who releases the dove.

Sentiment

This 2003 kind-of-documentary about the late Czech director Frantisek Vlacil is simply a stunning experience to watch. It is a collection of reenacted interviews, stark shots of the old mans room, and various shots of the woods in his films.
The light contrast is fascinating. The black sillouhettes and the burnt out sunlight give a kind of organic eerieness, an intensity and a deolation. The small figures in the huge background, standing alone. The slow camera movement, a return to the love of the image which is let to speak for itself. One can read the inevitability of destruction, of pointlessness here; indeed, it is there. But there is a certain beauty and even humour, a certain noumenal quality.
The light really is fascinating. How the choice of light on the old man's face at once washes out texture, it covers half his face as black and the other in whites. Yet at times the texture of the various greys is allowed to show.
The conversation itself is at once utterly uninformative, parochial, and also intensely beautiful. In its' very process of inquisition it bursts its own pretension, an obvious feature. The messages, the unconnected senteces are indeed hillarious, but also wonderfully present a non-stylised picture of an actual human being, full of bullshit and fragility but also an epic, Ahab-esque character.
A short, stark, beautiful piece of filmaking.