gudaulin

I saw Legion at a Czech festival. In a peculiar way, it combines a relatively decent cast (Paul Bettany and others have more to offer than just participation in a trashy spectacle) and a certain craftsmanship of the crew with a terribly idiotic script that resigns from elementary logic and consistency. Add to that a B-movie budget and the fact that instead of turning the weaknesses of the film into an ironic exaggeration, the creators take themselves deadly seriously. There's no accounting for taste, but even B-movie commercial production should have some level of quality. Overall impression: 10%.

While watching the movie, I wondered how Hollywood studios would deal with this particular subject matter. They would cast Tom Hanks in the lead role, and the tear-jerking script would be based on the most clichéd emotional manipulation, devoid of any unpleasant controversy, so the movie would end with a pathetic happy ending. Naturally, it would all revolve around lifeless relationship constructs. Fortunately, Nakache and Toledano took a different approach, which can be considered the opposite of the French hit The Intouchables. In the former case, they chose pure comedy, while this time they offer civility supported by slightly amusing moments. In The Intouchables, they used the motif of a social fairy tale, whereas this time their script is based on intimate knowledge of the environment and the issues of autism. The film doesn't pretend the impossible or claim that positive solutions exist where only stressful, thankless work helps, and assistants face endless risks living with their charges. The movie seeks to express appreciation for those who provide service to patients, and it is convincing in that regard. While The Intouchables was strong in terms of its story, The Specials put the characters and community in the foreground. The Specials is not an activist film in the traditional sense, meaning a film that stirs things up with the intention of fighting for something and achieving something. However, it is, in the best sense of the word, engaged in order to show a slice of society and the problems that we don't really want to see or deal with. The excellent cast, led by Vincent Cassel, underscores the film's quality. Overall impression: 90%.

Even if I didn't know that Jean-Jacques Sempé was the author and that the film was shot in English, I would still immediately localize the story in the French countryside. From every shot, you can feel the atmosphere of the French south, small towns in Provence, or the neighborhood, where pieces of history can be sensed from the stone houses and the locals' laid-back attitude. In some ways, the film reminds me of Pascal Campion's drawings. Raoul Taburin is a likable film during which you probably won't burst out laughing, but a light smile will be sure to remain on your face. It is a small, pleasant film that will evoke a positive mood. Overall impression: 75%.

A massive advertising campaign does not tempt if it offers inferior goods. This is an ambitious and costly project that effortlessly surpasses the overwhelming majority of Czech television productions. HBO's production has lived up to expectations, reviving the late 80s incredibly convincingly. The choice of locations, visual aspects, and music all contribute to creating an atmosphere of depression, squalor, and societal decay. The casting is outstanding and it is hard to criticize anything about the ensemble cast, and from the multitude of excellent performances, I dare to highlight Táňa Pauhofová in the lead role, Lenka Vlasáková as her worn-out sister, and Jan Vlasák as the manipulative STB veteran. I see certain weaknesses in the script, as the thriller adventure of Marie into the Soviet military base, where she - by chance - becomes a witness to the elimination of a weak link in the Soviet conspiracy, belongs to a qualitatively different part of television production. The series clearly overestimates the capabilities of the Soviet secret service in the autumn of '89, and the methods described in the script were typical of the 50s. At the end of the Soviet era, kidnappings, murders, and torture would have seemed like an elephant in a china shop. But it's nothing more than genre fiction and intended for an international audience. Overall impression: 80%.

When your gray hair and wrinkles start to become impossible to overlook, technology steals your livelihood and the feeling of not understanding the world around you anymore triumphs, you start to mentally go back to your youth, when your wife hadn't slept with your friend yet and didn't show that you were a burden to her and she would rather kick you out of the apartment. Back to the time when worries didn't plague you and the future looked great. What will your reaction be to the offer of becoming someone else or going back to any past time? No, don't worry, it's not sci-fi and you won't be time traveling. It's just a clever commercial project, where a film studio and a group of actors will arrange an encounter with your revived dream. Maybe even with the love of your life (they can handle much more difficult tasks, after all). The film has everything that a commercially successful and quality film should have. A clever and original idea, an excellent script, and a great cast. The old guard, led by Auteuil and Fanny Ardant, enjoys the role-playing and their younger colleagues keep pace with them. La Belle Epoque is a playful romantic comedy and at the same time a story set in the filmmaking environment, where the screenwriter and director is a god and his desires (almost) a law. Doria Tillier proves that the supply of beautiful, charismatic, and talented actresses in France is practically inexhaustible. Overall impression: 90%.

In the first decade of his directing career, Hřebejk aroused expectations and with at least two titles, he managed to tune in to the needs of Czech society to reconcile so that the wolf would be fed and the goat would remain whole, along with recent history. In later times, his work instead caused doubts. He acts as a shooter suffering from conjunctivitis, so he relies on his instincts and blindly fires. Maybe it will work out. In the context of this trend, Innocence is relatively passable, but in no way good. It is decently directed, and even Geislerová performs decently, but two stories in one are too much. I would have been content with one criminal case seen through to its end, where it would be about a broader statement about the time and society, and where I wouldn't feel constructiveness, greed, and creative helplessness. I will leave three stars because as part of Czech contemporary production, it is still above average, but I won't raise my overall impression above 50%.

It is too sweeping and fragmented, which can be the price to pay for editing a TV series into a feature film. It is poorly cast - I consider the acting of Václav Jiráček wooden, Ester Geislerová has an acting range as wide as the selection of snacks in Russian supermarkets, and even Cibulková doesn't seem very convincing. The film holds together somewhat thanks to the performances of the supporting actors - Huba, Dlouhý, and Bareš. Cieslar's direction has never been able to inspire me. I consider him to embody mediocrity and wasted opportunities. Considering Czech standards and knowing the TV material, the film has decent production quality but even that cannot make me give it 3 stars. Overall impression: 45%.

The balance of my encounters with Jim Jarmusch's work hasn't been particularly encouraging in the last decade. He received a total of five stars for three films, and I preferred to avoid his latest piece altogether. It used to be different, and a rewatch of Dead Man, which fascinated me in the 90s, was supposed to bring an explanation of whether he had changed or if I had. It's not nostalgia, but I fell in love with Dead Man again. Jim's later titles bore me, but Dead Man is full of tension, has an incredible atmosphere, and at the same time, is not devoid of Jarmusch's typical minimalist poetics and the existential dimension of Blake's journey into nonexistence. The hero of the anti-western is not a hardened adventurer but a shy young man without knowledge of the environment, who is not looking for a cowboy job, but rather an accountant, and desperately does not fit into the surrounding world. His escape from the anger of a wealthy industrialist leads him to an Indian named Nobody, who, due to his abduction in childhood and his upbringing in a white civilization, feels the same rootlessness and loneliness as the main character. Together, they head towards the ocean, facing hired killers and preparing to accept their destiny. Jarmusch's direction gives the landscape a mystical touch, the camera sometimes has a hypnotic effect, and the overall impression is enhanced by Neil Young's simple but impressive music. Johnny Depp is the perfect fit for the lead role. His resigned, slightly absent expression fits perfectly into the Jarmusch world. Overall impression: 90%.

It's not that Toman doesn't have a number of shortcomings that can be pointed out, but even with the knowledge of their existence, the film ultimately turned out to be one of the most pleasant encounters with Czech cinema in recent years. History is of long-term interest to me, making this an excellent prequel to the fourth and fifth parts of the TV series Czech Century. The more you know about the events of the first post-war years and the personalities (mostly repugnant creatures) of the then-ruling elite, the more you will enjoy the film. I have no problem with the fact that Toman is not actually the protagonist in Trojan's film, but rather the period of the rise of the Communist Party, which ends with the seizure of power and the establishment of the "people's democracy." The representatives of the regime are not anonymous names to me, but rather specific historical figures whose actions I am familiar with and to whom the actors simply gave a face. I am willing to forgive Trojan's minor deviations from history this time, because his excursion into the past corresponds to the given era, and it is certainly not a farce like Identity Card. If there is any flaw worth mentioning, it is the casting of Jiří Macháček in the lead role. His naive (non)acting works at the local theater but with this demanding role, which requires strong character acting. Understandably, he does not handle it well and seems out of place. Overall impression: 75%.

Excalibur is considered by my generation as the first contact with the fantasy genre, and its influence on shaping the ideas of Western cinema fans was undeniable and very strong. This can reliably be traced in nostalgic comments made by others. During my youth, questioning the quality of Excalibur was unthinkable, but it's 2019 and everything is different now. Anachronisms in weaponry and attire leave me unfazed this time, as it is after all a fairy tale and not a historical story. The omnipresent clumsiness, whether it concerns the way the Arthurian legend is told, the theatrical performances of the actors led by Nigel Terry, or the movements of the extras in shiny metal imitations of armor, is undeniable and at times truly painful. Where the film strives to be enchanting and mystical, it now appears kitschy and unintentionally funny. The music has withstood the test of time, and the camera can leave a decent impression, but otherwise, there are few reasons to revisit Excalibur. Within the genre, not only the adaptation of The Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones have convincingly surpassed it, but also a number of other lesser-known projects. Overall impression: 55%. The lackadaisical nature of Boorman's direction is evidenced by a scene where two running knights have lit cigarettes in their mouths...