The young factory worker Andula (Hana Brejchová) lives in a boarding school in a small town where there are ten women for every man and there is nothing to do after work. The local factory director therefore convinces the army to open a site there. This only half works, as older reservists come instead of young conscripts.

The first half of the movie is dominated by a dance evening where the soldiers and the ladies from the town are supposed to get to know each other. Three men who are no longer young are after Andula and her friends and try to win them over with wine. But Andula ends up in the bed of the pianist Míla (Vladimír Pucholt) instead.

The inexperienced girl, who longs for love, easily believes in promises and flattery. That is why she soon travels to Prague to visit Míla, who still lives with his parents but is not there. The evening, which essentially forms the second half of the movie, turns out completely differently than she had expected. It becomes unpleasant...

Like Forman's other two Czech feature-length films, this one is also characterized by a special humour that always contains a tragic component. All three films are united by a certain potential for alienation in relation to the protagonists, who are in no way glorified. At the same time, Forman creates an unvarnished picture of the times. This film is undoubtedly one of the major works of the Czechoslovak New Wave and therefore naturally belongs in Czech Film Wednesday. As we already had the other two films in the program, this is unfortunately the last film by Miloš Forman for us.

This film will be shown as part of the "Czech Film Wednesday" series, as always in the original version with German subtitles.

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This time we have again scheduled two performances, at 6pm and 8pm.

Tickets for 6 pm

Tickets for 8 pm

In Miloš Forman's third feature film, you can recognize elements of his two other Czech films. The previous film, "Černý Petr" (Black Peter), is particularly reminiscent of the way the generations interact with each other. While the father in particular was problematized there, here it is Míla's mother with her eternal lament and only slightly pronounced empathy. The following film, "Hoří, má panenko" (The Firemen's Ball), is reminiscent of much of what happens at the dance evening, especially the treatment of women and people's awkwardness with each other. In all three films, Forman shows the characters absolutely unvarnished, even with their ugly sides.

The film is very much carried by the leading actress Hana Brejchová. You have to be careful not to confuse her with her more famous sister Jana, as they are very similar not only in name but also in appearance. Miloš Forman was married to Jana at the time and therefore Hana's brother-in-law. As she did not emigrate, they were not to work together again until 1984 in "Amadeus".

The film also features a number of actors with whom Forman worked in his other Czech feature films. Vladimír Pucholt, here as Míla in one of the main roles, was one of the protagonists in "Černý Petr". Jan Vostrčil, the fire chief in "Hoří, má panenko" and father in "Černý Petr", only makes a very brief appearance here.Milada Ježková and Josef Šebánek (Míla's parents) or Josef Kolb (factory director) played in "Hoří, má panenko". On the other hand, Forman again relied on a number of amateurs who only appeared in this or perhaps one other film.

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Czechoslovakia, 1965, 77 min, OmU

Director: Miloš Forman

Starring: Hana Brejchová, Vladimír Pucholt, Vladimír Menšík, Ivan Kheil, Jiří Hrubý, Milada Ježková, Josef Šebánek, Josef Kolb, Marie Salačová, Jana Nováková