Marigold

This film is a free adaptation of Zrotal's village comedy of the same name, which perhaps only stood out from what was average at the time through the character of the progressive pastor (for which the critics crucified the author) and the pleasantly strange humor, which gave in the film the temporarily pardoned Burian the opportunity to do some nice situational mischief. Still, it's sad to watch Burian's self-criticism, because he usually fabricates and devalues his comedic abilities in the rubble of the script. All other aspects of Lipský’s and Strejček’s film are in the period norm - folk humor, allegorical tractors, and agitation for the beneficial influence of collective farms. All this is interspersed with fragments of folklore and completed with a cheerful Slovak dialect. The Hen and the Sexton takes place during the time of the carnival and is eloquent proof of the infiltration of ideologized new mythology of a happy future with all hard workers, plans, commitments and other newspeak concepts into the village tradition, its transformation and re-interpretation. I'm a little sorry that the film didn’t include the scene with the carnival masks, which are made up exclusively of factory temporary workers - it had a lot of eloquence in it. From the point of view of an unbiased spectator, this comedy has nothing special about it, nothing dazzling, nothing that could captivate and leave a deeper impression.

A handsome and sexy definition of pulp poetics that said everything it had to say, and also everything it could say. All plagiarism is just a useless repetition of the same thing - this is literally a biblically bloated folio. It was definitely Tarantino who popularized the atypical narrative form and brought into play all the declining pop-cultural emblems and mechanisms that until then had somehow remained on the fringes of generally accepted culture. The only flaw in the beauty of the Pulp Fiction poetics is that they go completely beyond me. But definitely Tarantino's best film.

For me, it’s in the same weight category as the favored The Shawshank Redemption. The film is brilliantly designed to grab you by your soul. It is a film with well-hidden manipulation and cheap gestures, which at first glance completely disappear in a refined game with the audience's emotions. The well-arranged narrative, which is licked like a good ice cream, is pleasantly sweet and smells like strawberries. But like any ice cream, it's more of a tasty dessert. True, Zemeckis and Hanks are master confectioners, and Forrest is a spoiled dessert in every way. With its readability, well-created illusion of intimacy and nicely wrapped thought structure, Forrest Gump is simply a treat for the masses. But I simply prefer the main film courses, and that is why this touching sweetness is only a four-star affair. In a Hollywood feature film, however, the story of a lame boy who goes through modern American history with the ease and foresight of a genius idiot is a truly rare phenomenon that will stick in your memories for a long time. But for me it will never be as intense as it was when I first watched it as a boy...

Frič's average attempt to create an ideological propaganda film. Marvan has again carved out his emblematic role of a grumpy grandfather who, through the collective, will be converted to the true faith and understand the joyful reality of socialism. Structurally, the film is clearly influenced by Vašek Káňa and his production drama Karhan's Team. In other words, it unfolds a relatively harmonious course of construction (fulfillment of the plan), which is disrupted by technical difficulties and a few non-conforming individuals, supplemented by several family scenes (filmed at a rather brisk pace) and escalated with a final catharsis, during which the plan is fulfilled and Šebesta joins masses of working class heroes. It Happened in May is simply a typical representative of a work propaganda film, which at some point slips to talking about improvement, which is difficult for our people to understand. For the well-informed viewer, it provides quite interesting visual material for May Day rituals, but overall it is not a film so ideologically accentuated that it is entertaining through its pathos, nor a comedy of such quality that it is worth watching. From a professional point of view, Sorel cinema offers several more interesting and inspiring pieces...

As a man afflicted since childhood with love for the phenomenon of the super agent in Her Majesty's Secret Service (they have been a part of my life since 1984, when I saw the first Moor film), and as someone who has seen all the Bond films, I say: Casino Royale is an old school Bond film that I've missed since the days of Goldfinger. Daniel Craig is Bond in the best Connery tradition, yet he is also new, original, almost popular. He gives back to the legend its gloss and energy. Martin Campbell perfectly combined the thrilling action rides in an old-fashioned coat with a calm (but internally electrifying) game of poker, in which the gentleman's style of Guy Hamilton and Terence Young is reflected. This conservative spy level may not captivate today's viewer, but I was completely fascinated. No doubt the good old days are coming back and Pierce Brosnan's exaggerated CGI action era is waving goodbye. I won't remember it in a bad way, but Daniel Craig is the Bond of my heart, hand in hand with Sir Connery. Bond's humanity, egoism, vulnerability, fragility... Craig does it all with extraordinary credibility and certainty. Hand in hand with this is the fantastic villain Le Chiffre (Auric Goldfinger, you've met your match!), the most magical Bond-girl (forgive me, beautiful Ursula, but Eva Green gave Vesper a soul, not just a body), and the increasingly charming M Judi Dench. Martin Campbell does more than just an action routine - he holds the film wonderfully together and the chemistry of the characters drives like an Aston Martin. Although Casino Royale is far from being problem-free - lapses in logic, naivety, flatter passages, unspokenness and recklessness, just about everything that is inseparable from the series - it is definitely the best bond since the 1960s.

It is really interesting to compare how people react to similarly tuned comedies from the First Republic. While similarly meaningless festivities (often even more trivial in nature) seem to be acceptable to our people there, "The Village Revolt" irritates with its completely toothless ideological realities. At the same time, the toothlessness is just one of the reasons why I liked this agrarian party so much. Josef Mach's film goes far beyond contemporary aesthetics and norms, and although it is appropriately joyful, and although it contains all the stereotypes of the time, it works with an extremely fresh and rustic element of feminine emancipation. For this reason, it does not avoid the eroticism of the time (the outline of the breast on the canvas is very bold from the perspective of the time period, as well as the ubiquitous obvious ambiguities). The conflict between old-fashioned men and modern women guarantees plenty of fun gags, which are either intentionally or unintentionally ridiculous. František Filipovský played an excellent caricature of a village redneck, while his drunken call for "pork goose" captures the trivial, yet humorous poetics of the film. This is only completed by the incredibly naive work of the cameraman, who at certain moments tries to experimentally tilt his camera, perhaps following the example of expressionist cinematography. At that moment, The Village Revolt is funnier than most films. Not to mention the fact that with all its stereotypes the emancipatory component of this comedy is very current, the technical design is cutely bad = I had a ton of fun for 105 minutes. This rarely happens to me when watching First Republic comedies. And the ideological messages in this film are suppressed by the year 1949, so you can easily watch it without gnashing your teeth.

The brilliant parable of the demise of humanity culminates in the technical means of storytelling. The music is a very interesting mix of apocalyptic chorus, unpleasant noises and hits, which can be heard directly in the fictional world (from the radio and the futuristic hi-fi system). I have to admit that after watching Children of Men... I will never forget Ruby Tuesday. A similarly effective resource is the editing, which in some places is completely absent and allows the film to flow in incredibly long and raw units. This highlights the expressive work of Emmanuel Lubezki's handheld camera (he also shot Burton's Sleepy Hollow). With its shaky eye, the camera adds a touch of authenticity to both dialogue scenes and action sequences, which are unhealthily imminent and impressive. The actor group led by the excellent Clive Owen deserves great recognition... there is no doubt that his rough masculine face is endowed with gentle inner acting and natural fragility, favoring civilian positions. Michael Caine in the role of Jasper once again demonstrates what the strengthening charisma of old age is... Claire Hope-Ashitey's unknown face shines and can easily match a star like Julianne Moore. The main star, however, is Alfonso Cuarón, who, after his difficult involvement in the Harry Potter films, finally submits work that ranks him amongst the top magnitude of director stars. The way he works with large sets of shots, with human faces, the way in which the film intensity escalates, the way he evokes the atmosphere of the future world with minimal resources and the way he reflects the decaying state of our world in the future world with minimal resources is admirable and worth acknowledging. Children of Men is not a matter of vain moralizing, nor a disaster film based on a scheme and all-telling symbols. It is essentially an intimate film, one that is harshly authentic and honest. On a small sample of humanity, he presents a horrible vision of the end of humanity, which is symbolically raised in its resolution... there is no doubt that this "science fiction" is nothing but the freezing hyperbole of today. For me, the current spectator experience of the year.

A typical example of the propaganda film genre that permeated the entire culture of Czechoslovak social realism. Sequens takes over the character and story constants of the village drama – the clash between the old world (the world of landowners and their vassals) and the new world (the world of the tractor station) is transferred to the level of standardized heroes. Enthusiastic village girl Vlasta underwent an ideological initiation on the construction of youth and brings the message of the new order to the village, which refuses to give up the relic of old times – borders. I was quite disappointed by the performance of the negative characters, which, unlike literary works, has no energy in the Way Leading to Happiness and remains only with the wooden-bile landowner Fulín. However, this shortcoming is balanced by the tractor station team with all the sublimated erotica, mechanized expression and prescription enthusiasm. The key motif of the Way Leading to Happiness is the tractor as a contradiction of the horse (old world). The Zetor peace tank is a true messenger of the new order, an initiating tool and a ubiquitous companion of man. Its people are exemplary models of the "new humanity" according to the aesthetic and ideological norm of the time period. The culminating examples of the incorporated ideology are the scenes of mass singing, particularly the Chastushka cited by Lomoz, whose tone is almost sacral. The pathos of the film is sometimes ridiculous (all of the double meanings with the fulfillment of the norm that are cute from today's point of view), sometimes freezing (the viewing of Vlasta's father to the sound of the tractor-cultural choir is almost pathological). The comic creation of Rudolf Deyl Jr., whose warehouseman Karásek embodies a comic archetype so typical of Czech social realism, should also be considered a typical prop. From a formal point of view, the Way Leading to Happiness is a terrible, amateur film, poorly constructed, disharmonious, playing out in the coveted naivety of Jiřka Švorcová and her comrades. However, from today's point of view, the content is so burdened with the seed of ideology that it breathes something mystical onto the viewer, as if he were watching the initiation ritual of a bizarre cult. As a person familiar with contemporary newspeak and the emblematic language of art, I had a lot of fun with the obvious and coded sense. The film is impressive and it cannot be evaluated.

If I didn’t know that Andrew Adamson had not directed both Shrek films, I would consider him an ordinary Disney man who edits films about animals, talking cars, and dreaming children on an assembly line. His direction is the greatest routine, and in The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the routine is ice-cold, withdrawn, scenic, without any hint of mysticism, mystery or atmosphere. Narnia is simply a snowy space behind a magic closet - a space where ungainly fairy-tale creatures live, a space that is controlled without any motivation or inner logic. None of this fit into the film. Actually ... it would be alright if it was clear from the film that it was a fairy-tale spectacle, but attempts at battle epics ala The Lord of the Rings (and the constant literal quotes of some shots) lead me to conclude that The Chronicles of Narnia is kind of a pig-dog. As a fairy tale it has no magic and charm, and as a fantasy epic it is terribly naive, shallow and lacks any mythology. Compared to Jackson's Middle Earth, the interpretation of the fantastic land of C. S. Lewis is tame, flat, two-dimensional. The kid actors unnecessarily overact, their characters in no way captivate the viewer, and paradoxically, the whole story is carried by computer creatures headed the truly excellent lion Aslan. As the embodiment of ice evil, Tilda Swinton resembles more than anything a shady clone of the vampire brothers from The Matrix Reloaded, and even her minions do not have the proper energy to bring a spark of drama to the trivial scheme of the story. Even so, The Chronicles of Narnia is watchable thanks to the dry digital effects; however, one feels no wonder when watching it, and that bothers me a lot when watching the fantasy genre. [50%]

A film in which the poetics of The Cherry Orchard meet the poetics of socialist realism. The poetics of the old peaceful bourgeois world with a chaotic and bizarre new order of the Stalinist line. In the peaceful setting of the Soviet countryside, in the harmonic rhythm of a traditional Russian family, an inconspicuous, but then absolutely captivating story of revenge and conscience plays out. The story of a man in the meat grinder of history, a man scorched (not tired!) by the sun of revolution. There is no doubt that the intimate story, similarly to Yugoslav cinematography, metaphorically mirrors the world of the Stalinist USSR (a world shaped and dragged by ideology). It mirrors it with almost frightening suggestiveness, yet unforced by the shallow shocking shots. At the same time, Michalkov plays out extraordinarily pure and believable tones of romance, in which the incredibly charismatic performance of the director himself, and especially of his daughter Naděžda, dominate. Their mutual harmony is absolute, beautiful, indescribable. Because of these two things, the drama of a man who believes in the religion of the new order, the utopia of a beautiful tomorrow, but who eventually becomes a victim thereof, is civilly harmonious and drastically dramatic beneath its surface. Oleg Menshikov also gives a fantastic performance - his study of an internally divided man has a legible structure and enormous internal dynamics. Michalkov's feeling for the composition of the image is absolute, and for alternating peaceful scenes of the Old Russian family and even comically conceived intrusions of socialism into people's lives. The leitmotifs of the ball lightning and the wandering mover frame the precise composition, giving it a regular rhythm and a touch of absurdity. The construction of the Stalinist balloon then symbolizes the eternal presence of the leader in everyday joys and sorrows. Not to mention the song that gave the film its name and which, with its melancholy, brings tears to the eyes. Michalkov's statement about the Stalinist regime is therefore so effective and so immediate that it is not in and of itself an accusation, but rather a biased account of people's fates. People whose lives have been burned to ashes by the phantom leader of one-sixth of the world.