Bábovky

Maybe I’m spoiled by Scandinavian dramas that are able to create great atmosphere without a single musical tone. To the contrary, in this Czech movie the dramatic atmosphere is completely built on music. A dull melodramatic music that lasted 95 minutes out of total 97 minutes and it took me a while to get used to it. I would probably find some faults with the ending as well because the story that is told in this movie is totally underminedat the end. What I was watching most of the movie were really sad characters whose lives made me really sad. Are people around me really like that? I don’t want to believe that. The characters oscillates between extremes during this movie. But after I finished it I had a feeling that the actors did their best and a lot of characters were really great. Marek Taclík, Lenka Vlasáková and mainly Jana Plodková gave their best performances. In the end I have to say that I was quite satisfied. We film dramas differently here than in the rest of the world but I don’t think that Sweethearts is as bad as it is rated on this site. Quite the opposite. (2020.09.26)

More of a dramedy than a comedy, but decent by Czech standards. An adult film about adult people and adult problems. Marek Taclík takes care of most of the humour and Jana Plodková hypnotizes with her beautiful body. The finale is quite emotionally strong also thanks to the well-chosen musical score. Yeah not bad. 6/10. (2021.09.24)

I liked the first two films that Havlík worked on. His second two films, on which he collaborated with Radka Třeštíková, are a different story. The book version of Sweethearts is a classic bestseller by Mott. In the film adaptation, the original structure of twelve separate stories of individual women told from their point of view loses a little of its charm, and it is replaced by a kind of untidy interweaving and a finale that would put others to shame. The main characters consist of today's all-stars, and formally Sweethearts has everything it needs, so the average viewer is, of course, satisfied. (2021.08.21)

Sweethearts is a melodrama dealing with, among other things, prostitution, drugs, infidelity, brain cancer, suicidal tendencies, escapes from home and many pregnancies, whilst being surprisingly presented as something relaxing, lively and spiced with comedic quotes. This is another Czech film that tries to act as a bittersweet life story, but at the same time is completely detached from reality (the depiction of the relationship between a prostitute and her pimp or employment in multinational corporations is seemingly from another universe) and whose characters are just primitive figures defined by one to two stereotypes (all of the adult males are selfish and ruthless bastards, while the female heroines are their troubled and naive victims). Despite the banality and dullness of the content, however, Sweethearts is excellently directed and has a feel for storytelling and a solidly mastered formal concept (editing, camera, music, hard-working actors). Sweethearts also has a decent tempo, a perfectly staged climax filmed in one shot, and even the gradual unravelling of the connections between the individual characters is quite entertaining. Overall, this is a film whose masterful cinematographic processing is several levels better than its pathetically written plot and flat characters deserve. (2020.09.23)

When I was putting the film into the player, I already knew that I would be disappointed once again, because Czech film production has rarely brought me joy for a while now. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that this film actually had a story and that more emphasis was placed on the story than on product placement. Not that it didn't appear in the film, it was present and clearly visible, but no one constantly beat me over the head with it like a rotting fish. Pleasant change. The characters (especially the male ones) seemed a bit stereotypical to me, but as a whole, everything worked for me until the moment when all the plot lines intersected at the hotel. There, they pushed too hard, and on top of that, the creators buried their efforts with a desperate ending, so three pieces couldn't possibly come out of it. Compared to other Czech gems, it was, however, quite a cultural experience :-) (2021.10.05)

The dramatic or comedic line doesn't quite work here, but I didn't get bored at all and I liked Sweethearts. A lot of the credit for this goes to the great performances of almost everyone involved. Moreover, I really like most of them. Not to mention that Rudolf Havlík also did a good job as director. For the above reasons I have been a bit more generous in my rating, although I would have given the movie three stars without a second thought for its too relaxed and straightforward ending. (70%) (2022.10.02)