Otakar Brousek

In 1897, in a castle near the town of Werewolfville in the Carpithians, a slightly deranged Professor Orfanik experiments with his new inventions which include, even at this early date, television and a film camera. He is also an obsessed opera fan, keeps the body of his favorite diva preserved in a crypt in the castle. In order to keep away nosy visitors, the baron's mad-scientist assistant invents all sorts of spooky phenomena in order to give the castle a creepy reputation.

In a Prague shop, an assistant has been carrying on an affair with the dishonest, married manager. An emotionally repressed auditor with domestic problems of his own uncovers serious stock discrepancies. A test of loyalties and a questioning of values concludes in tragedy.

It shows the Neretva river from its source to the shores of the Adriatic Sea. The document also captures the original four-hundred-year-old bridge in Mostar.

Cyril Dadák (Václav Postránecký), a TV reporter falls in love at first sight with a young engineer Milena (Jaroslava Obermaierová) while he makes a reportage in a chemical factory. Milena has been dating for several years with a test driver Pavel (Rudolf Jelínek), however when she meets Cyril she feels that he might be the Mr Right. She accepts Cyril's invitation for a date and she spends a night with him. In the morning she finds in her flat Pavel. She wants to explain to him everything but Pavel makes coffee with a smile and gives her back the keys from the flat.

In post-WWII Communist Czechoslovakia, several characters considered bourgeois are sentenced to work in a junkyard for rehabilitation. Among them is a young man who pines for a female convict.

In Vražda v hotelu Excelsior, the interwar period homicide detective squad from Prague investigates the murder of a wealthy woman, Mrs Matoušová, which threatens the reputation of the eponymous luxury hotel popular with Prague’s elite. Even the retired police inspector Mrázek (František Filipovský), who works at the Excelsior as a hotel detective, is unable to help at first. Although the investigation inevitably uncovers the hotel staff’s scheming, Vacátko and his team unerringly follow the trail that leads them to the murderer…

Young knight John travels the world in search of fame and fortune, but also to help others and prove himself. However, things go dire fast and he becomes burdened with life's hardships. But then he meets a pretty water nymph, Mary.

Capturing the dark humor of Czech author Michal Viewegh's chronicle of life after the Velvet Revolution, this black comedy chronicles three decades in the life of a small Czech family. While the original novel centered on the protagonist Kvido from his conception through his adulthood, first time director Petr Nikolaev and screenwriter Jan Novak changed the focus to his parents Milena, an extremely self-effacing lawyer who acts on stage in her spare time, and Ales, a rather aimless government worker who tends to drift wherever the wind takes him. The lives of Ales and Milena change dramatically following the Russian invasion of Prague in 1968.

Ostrava - Kunčice , 1953: on the same day as the manifestation funeral for J. V. Stalin, the funeral of Brigadier Bédi Nevěřil, a tragic victim of the bureaucratic cadre machine... The story unfolds in the memoirs of another brigadier, former journalist Karel Kratochvil.

Dr. Lauren is staying in Prague for a conference and falls in love with Czech writer Jiri Kolmar.

Honza Pavelka (Jan Hrusínský) wins the junior motorbike speed races. His thirteen-year-old brother Martin (Roman Cada), his assistant and biggest fan, answers the questions of his schoolfriend Pavlína in a superior tone. Student Zuzana (Libuse Safránková), who gave her scarf to Honza to wear around his neck for the races as a talisman is Honza's girlfriend. He met her when he came to her parent's home to repair the TV set. Honza declines an invitation to celebration with his friends. He goes off with Zuzana instead, but she refuses his intimate advances. The offended young man, who is about to serve his two years in the army, tries to blackmail her emotionally and the couple breaks up. Martin tries various schemes to bring them together again.

A poor miner, Kuba Dařbuján, cares for his wife Markýtka and eleven children. When a newborn arrives, he seeks a godfather and, finding only Death fair to all, accepts a pact: as a doctor whom Death accompanies at the foot of a patient’s bed, he can heal; but if Death stands at the head, no cure is possible. Kuba eventually heals even a miserly brewer, violating the pact and imprisoning Death, leading to a world where no one can die and unforeseen chaos follows.

No description available.

A New Year's Eve television variety show from late 1979.

Experiences of a Tatra factory driver during demanding load tests of Tatra 148 trucks in extremely harsh climatic conditions during the construction of the Nizhnevartovsk oil pipeline.

A quarrel between divorced waitress Mája and her fifteen-year-old son Petr ends with the boy physically attacking his mother, and he is sent to an institution for juvenile delinquents.

A costume, slightly erotic, love fable with grotesque elements and a distinct black humor accent. Historicizing, Rococo decadence, visual stylization resonates with the wit, causticity, surprise and refined titillation of the theme. At the beginning of the story, the commentary says: "We know almost everything about the suffering of the working people before the French Revolution, but not much is known about the debauched life of the nobility. It is therefore high time to explore this less attractive topic in more detail." With wry humor, author and director Jaroslav Pozzi weaves together several stories describing the juicy sexual games of the rotten French nobility...

Prince Thomas longed to prove to himself and his royal parents that he was truly an adult. And on the day he came of age, his father gave him a unique opportunity—an opportunity called Blouzov. Blouzov, an old castle that the prince was to rule alone, was no ordinary place. There were many rumors about it, and they were quite wild. But the truth turned out to be even darker than the speculation. In fact, Blouzov was ruled by the chambermaid Johana with the help of dark forces. She and her equally mischievous son, the water sprite Artur, involved the inexperienced Tomáš in their vile intrigues as soon as he appeared at the castle. And even though he soon gained powerful allies and helpers for his "test of adulthood"—his childhood friend Petr and his beautiful sister Jitka—it was not at all easy to stand up to the evil spells and keep his wits about him at the right moment.

A psychological drama about a nurse and a seriously ill car racer and factory driver...

A group of children are investigating a chain of mysterious events during the seventies.

Ing. Bernard announces that his wife has not returned from visiting relatives in Berlin. Lieutenant Tereza Machátová, who together with Captain Landa is investigating the matter, puts the facts into connection with the discovery of the drowned woman's body.

The Czech film Svítalo All Night was made to commemorate the 35th anniversary of the liberation of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Army and is dedicated to all those who fought and gave their lives in Prague in the May Uprising of 1945. Behind the historical events, the creators see mainly their simple, unassuming participants. Thus, we are presented with a number of apt portraits, whether it is the central hero Dr. Soukup and nurse Daniela on the side of the fighting Czechs, or a captain and a simple private in a Red Army unit coming to the aid of the fighting Prague, or an old, war-weary German major, who only realises the senselessness of the war at the sight of a fanatical, cynical lieutenant for whom Nazi ideology represents the meaning of life.

The thrilling story begins in 1318, during the reign of John of Luxembourg, when the Czech nobility rebelled against the king. However, the lord of Zlenice, Oldřich of Zlenice, did not join the resistance. He summoned the surrounding nobles to his castle for negotiations... and in the morning he was found dead. He had been murdered in his chamber, which was locked from the inside!

The story of a friendship for life and death captures a real event that took place in the snowy Krkonoše Mountains in 1913. The actors of the drama were Bohumil Hanč, one of our first ski racers, and his friend Václav Vrbata. The film's plot takes place between 1912 and 1913 and is framed by two international 50 km races. After winning in 1912, Bohumil Hanč wants to stop racing at the behest of his wife Slávka. In 1913, strong foreign competitors enter the race, so Bohumil succumbs to the pleas of his friends and decides to race for the last time. However, the weather changes during the race. Strong winds and snow begin to blow, severe frost sets in, and for the racers, it means a fight for their lives.

Captain Záruba investigates after an anonymous tip flags the seemingly extravagant lifestyle of Chemotex technician Dagmar Králová. Summoned to discuss the matter, Králová’s quarrel with engineer Vaněček, who secretly runs a suburban bootleg alcohol factory, triggers panic among the illicit network led by hotelier Černý. When Králová is found dead near the site of a murdered hitchhiker, autopsy reveals a different killer, launching parallel murder investigations. Forensic teams uncover the clandestine distillery, and gradually piece together motives and perpetrators behind both deaths.

In the Hussite times, religious truth was sifted even on the tips of weapons. When in 1430 the Hussites set out on a raid to Nuremberg, the so-called Spanila Cavalry, to defend their doctrine, the young commander of the cavalry, the landowner Keřský, whose bride had once been kidnapped by a vicious crusader, saw it as an opportunity for personal revenge. Although Oldřich Daněk has tried to establish a distinctive interpretation of historical events, he reflects on where the blinded desire to punish a bad deed with further cruelty leads, but his version seems too thesis-like and lifeless, it does not rise above the descriptively illustrated scenes from old Czech chronicles...

A group of saboteurs search for a weapons cache hidden by the Nazi army. Beskydy in the summer of 1950: the StB agent Borek infiltrates a group of saboteurs hidden in the Beskydy mountains. They are preparing terrorist actions against the ongoing collectivisation in the village. The group is led by Ervín Kopal and Metud Hanák. Borek is to make contact with them, secure the saboteurs and discover a weapons depot. After many dramatic events, the task is accomplished, but at the highest cost...

After many decades in Germany, Marie Hahn will come to Prague to meet her relatives and friends. She learns unflattering information about her husband's behaviour during the German occupation, she suffers health problems, but even her daughter is not interested in helping her mother...

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In 363, somewhere in Mesopotamia, on a campaign against the Persians, the emperor Julian, who had succeeded Constantine after his victory over Gaul, was going through a personal crisis. He sees that the new philosophical trend, Christianity, is as cruel and implacable as the old paganism, and so he returns to the ancient philosophers. He knows that, as a potentate, he is surrounded by a pack of careerists who are all about loot, and in the face of an insidious external enemy. But his future fate is in their hands...

Three detective stories from industrial Ostrava. Police search in vain for a missing 16-year-old girl, but succeed in finding a mentally disturbed infant kidnapper. In a case of robbery, at the cost of injuring one of the investigators, they manage to apprehend a lover fleeing with stolen money across the border to Poland...

A remake of Vávra's 1948 atomic age thriller Krakatit. Engineer Prokop creates the devastating explosive “Krakatit” and soon confronts manipulative agents and imperialist conspiracies. Realizing his invention’s threat, he fights to prevent its misuse, risking everything to stop those who seek to exploit his epochal discovery.

The rude and bitter mining engineer Štěrba strongly opposes the proposal of his colleague Ing. Vochoče to reopen mining in the old mine. Vochoč's plan is precisely prepared and could solve many problems. However, Štěrba does not want to explain anything to anyone, he does not want to talk to anyone, his only refuge is the pub and his only friend is a glass of alcohol. He has resigned himself to a relationship with his wife. No one knows that he has very good reasons to prevent Vochoč and the others from taking their meritorious initiative...

The main character of the story is Professor Trojan, the head of a Prague clinic, who is not experiencing the happiest of times. His cat has been poisoned with cyanide, he has a falling out with his son Petr, who has moved to Brno to be with his wife, the promising singer Eva, and only seeks out his father when he needs money, and as if that weren't enough, someone shoots him in the evening. Trojan initially considers it a mistake or a prank and does not share the fears of those around him. But then cyanide is discovered and one of the patients takes it from the assistant Dvoracek, who borrowed it for an unauthorized experiment. Trojan pairs the cyanide with a gunshot and slowly begins to suspect that someone is trying to kill him. At first he suspects Dvorak, who might become the foreman after his death, but later, as he falls deeper and deeper into a psychosis of fear and apprehension, he begins to suspect everyone around him...

This feature film based on the events of 1938 is a chronicle of the futile efforts of the Czechoslovak president Edvard Benes (Jirí Pleskot), politicians and ordinary citizens, to save the independence and the territorial integrity of the state from the advance of Hitler's Germany. On the 29th of March 1938 the leader of the Sudeten Germans Henlein (Werner Ehrlicher) has a meeting with Hitler (Gunnar Möller). Hitler orders him to intensify pressure on the Czechoslovak government. On the 24th of April in Carlsbad, the Sudetendeutsche Partei (Sudeten German Party) decides upon eight demands that are unacceptable to the Czechoslovak President, since they would ultimately lead to the break-up of the Republic. Benes still shows a certain willingness to negotiate, and Henlein resents this. The Germans are determined to make further negotiations impossible through incidents and violence.

A love story of a couple of mature people of completely different characters, who lived and worked side by side for years only as colleagues, but whose accidental trip to Slovakia to attend the wedding of Hedin's sister brought them closer, probably for the rest of their lives...

The problematic protagonist is the head designer of a housing association who wants to make a profit at any cost. His unwitting opponent is a bar pianist who accidentally witnesses the murder of a young man and sets out to investigate on his own. An old-world and somewhat comical figure, he poignantly interferes with the cops' work, only to find that he is the one who is credited with catching the perpetrator...

The years of Mánes' studies at art schools and on the period when the mature and distinctive artist was already promoting his concept of a new decoration of the Old Town Clock.

Film shows the struggle of the Czechoslovak armed forces against groups of Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) under command Burlak, who tried to pass through the territory of Slovakia.

Czech nobleman Petr Vok of Rozmberk (Milos Kopecký) is no longer so young, but his amatory adventures continue to arouse the envy of men and the indignation of respectable ladies. In his "female retinue" at the chateau in Bechyne he has twelve comely girls, but he still manages to seduce the miller's wife and the maid. Lord Vok is in great financial difficulties. His elder brother Vilém advises him to marry a rich woman. Petr surprises him by announcing his intention to marry the very young Katerina of Ludanice.

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Georges Flavier, once renowned Parisian hairdresser, lives alone since the death of his son and the departure of his wife. One night, he saves a stranger from drowning in the Canal Saint-Martin.

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Baker Jan Racek (Vladimír Repa) is a very hard-working and sensible man. His great passion is pigeon-keeping and also, for many years, Ruzenka (Ludmila Vostrcilová). They are going to get married but Racek is busy waiting for the pigeons' return and misses the wedding. The engaged couple is already getting a little older so the otherwise kind Ruzenka gets very angry at this and gives Racek an ultimatum - it's going to be her or the pigeons.

February 1948. The struggle of decisive social forces for the heart of Europe.

In this crime story, surprisingly, neither the all-powerful criminals nor the spies or saboteurs are pursued, as was once common. The plot is almost mundane: someone unwittingly siphoned off alcohol from a tanker, unaware that it was deadly methyl alcohol, intended for industrial use. Finding out where the poison has been transported and which people it endangers requires painstaking work.

Prague in the 1870s. Work in Smolík's sulphur factory is hard and dangerous to health. The poorly paid workers resemble torches because their clothes are soaked with poisonous phosphorus. Young Josef Rezler also works in the sulphur factory and uses his earnings to feed his mother and little sisters. He throws his perpetually drunken father out of the house. The older worker Brož forces Josef to learn to read and write. A cholera epidemic breaks out in Prague and Josef is the only one of his family to survive the disease...

The life of cabaret and theater actress Xena Longenová.

An attractive and challenging 16-year-old girl has no shortage of admirers, but she becomes the cause of a small-town problem when she accuses her charming uncle of rape after trying in vain to seduce him. The bitter comedy, the only film directed by actor Václav Lohnisky, relies on the lively acting of both Vladimír Menšík as the eloquent uncle and Lucie Žulová as the mischievous seductress.

A man and a woman from a different planet come to the Earth to get a cure for a disease that is apparently threatening to eradicate their civilisation.

During World War II, a German university professor creates a spy ring that supplies the Allies with information about Nazi plans...

The life of the famous French writer Alexander Dumas the Elder. Screenwriter Jaroslav Dietl did not hide his admiration for this literary giant, and in addition to the screenplay he also wrote a three-part TV play about Dumas (starring Vladimír Menšík). In Kachyn's film, Dumas played the father and son of the Štěpánková brothers, and it was a very difficult and difficult task for these young actors.

While hunting, Prince Radúz of Maguria wanders into the rival kingdom of the Tatra King, Stojmír. He discovers that their nations' long-standing feud stems from the bitter jealousy of Queen Runa, who was once rejected by Radúz’s father. Radúz is soon captured by Runa’s forces after crossing the border. His fate becomes entwined with the royal family when it is revealed that the white deer he killed belonged to Mahulena, the King’s youngest and most delicate daughter.

Technical school student Pavel Brychta, arrives at a youth correctional facility located within a chateau in Konečno. He is an atypical, but not hopeless case for the institution. Pavel comes from a well-off family and his antisocial behaviour on the verge of criminality was some kind of response to his difficult relationship with his authoritative father. However, it takes quite some effort for Pavel to find his place in this environment of bullying, and also diverse methods from the tutors

An image and music collage - a cinema concert - guided by a young sound engineer David, for whom the exhibition on E. F. Burian is an incentive to take more interest in this avant-garde artist. The film interweaves two strands - documentary and factual, drawing on contemporary material and archival images - and fictional with the story of David the sound engineer.

Biography of Karel Čapek.

The plot of the film follows a bus ride on the Prague - Karlovy Vary route and the actions of the people on it. A diverse group of people with various interests, professions and personalities gathered on the bus. Their encounter in the close environment of the bus gave the opportunity to create a whole series of good humorous situations. The ride on the express bus is a symbolic example of the contemporary life of our society, in which, just like when riding a bus, it is necessary to suppress many private interests and selfish qualities in order to successfully reach the destination.

France, mid-19th century. Church bells ring out in alarm; a monastery is on fire. In the ensuing chaos, a passing rider catches sight of a girl in a first-floor window. The fire has cut off her escape route, so without hesitation she jumps into his outstretched arms. She does not even know the face of her savior. However, he takes her locket with him. Two years later. Two stepbrothers live at Mornay Castle. The heir to the title and estate, the aristocratically refined Raoul, and Philip, a rude, unsociable man with a bad reputation. It is here, to the castle ball, that Mrs. Collier brings her daughter Charlotte, a shy and inexperienced convent girl...

Seventy-year-old filmmaker Karel Zeman recapitulated his thirty years of work in the field of animated and trick films. The film Karel Zeman for Children includes excerpts from Baron Prášil, The Tale of Hansel and Gretel, Mr. Prokouk, King Lávra and Journey to the Prehistoric Times. The film is presented on the 100th anniversary of the birth of this important figure of Czech cinema.

The film is essentially a feature-length commercial for an exhibition to mark the 40th anniversary of the nationalisation of the Czechoslovak film industry, to be held at the Prague U Hybernu venue. The protagonists of the piece are comedians Oldrich Kaiser and Jirí Lábus, who are set to accept an award from Japanese television representatives at the exhibition. At the same time, five gangsters plot to seize a revolutionary invention devised by professor Suzuki - a super holograph, which enables any figure from television to be transported in the flesh into the real world, and vice-versa.

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Attorney Horic is a specialist for cases connected with motoring. He approaches to his work unconventionally, he does not hesitate to search for evidence right in the terrain and he is willing to take various risks.

In 1944, the popular film actress Hlínová is arrested by the Gestapo for sheltering a Resistance man. A film producer uses his connections with the Nazis to promote her in order to finish the film. Just before the last day of filming, actress Hlínová realizes that she is under constant guard and wants to escape. However, she is arrested again.

A crime story set in the second half of the 19th century. Krasl, a Prague schoolteacher, is searching for a statue of the Golden Buddha, which is supposed to contain compromising materials on the factory owner Riessig.

At the end of the 1950s, some filmmakers attempted to escape the ideological dictates by turning to psychological drama. We watch as an aging, uptight, strict woman who has come to inspect a regional publishing house literally blossoms and snows. A few days of comfort and happiness, however, are capped by a bitter epiphany: the man who had so charmed her has indeed embezzled the money entrusted to him.

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