MON CHER PETIT VILLAGE

English description

Titre anglais : MY SWEET LITTLE VILLAGE Titre original : VESNICKO MA STREDISKOVA Directed by : Jiri Menzel with : János Bán, Marián Labuda, Rudolf Hrušínský, Petr Čepek Czechoslovakia, 1985, PAL, 4/3 - 98 mn zone 2, color, mono Original Czech version, with French subtitles Comedy about people who inhabit a small town. For years, the overbearing Pavek has endured Otik, the "town idiot," sharing his meals and the front seat of their dump truck. But Otik is such a sweet-natured fool that Pavek, exasperated as he becomes, always relents on his threats to find another partner. This Laurel and Hardy-like pair are at the heart of a comedy which finds humor in an abundance of everyday situations. The town doctor regularly wrecks his car because he's admiring the scenery, a romantic teenager develops a hopeless crush on his sister's schoolteacher, and an adulterous housewife and her boyfriend are just one step ahead of her suspicious, hot-headed husband. Jiri Menzel With his debut feature film CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS (1966), Czechoslovakian filmmaker Jiri Menzel became an important member in Czech New Wave cinema and won an Academy Award. Menzel started out as an assistant director and occasional actor for Vera Chytilova following his graduation from the Prague film school F.A.M.U. In 1965, Menzel directed an episode (THE DEATH OF MR BALTAZAR) for the feature anthology PEARLS OF THE DEEP, a tribute to distinguished Czech author Bohumil Hrabal. Later that year, he contributed an episode in a similar tribute to the writings of Josef Skvorecky, CRIME AT THE GIRLS SCHOOL. Following the success of CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS, Menzel directed CAPRICIOUS SUMMER (1968) and turned in a great performance as a tightrope walker (Menzel is actually an accomplished balancer and performs regularly on-stage). In 1969, he made LARKS ON A STRING, considered by many to be his best work. Unfortunately, its critical stance on Communism led to its being banned from release until 1990 when it played internationally. Because the film was banned, Menzel was barred from filmmaking until 1974 when he publicly announced that he supported Communism. He then made WHO LOOKS FOR GOLD?, but has since disowned the film because of the personal price he had to pay to make it. From the late 70s through the mid-80s, Menzel made non-political, nostalgic comedies that were almost slapstick at times. He had international success in 1986 with the delightful MY SWEET LITTLE VILLAGE. In the late 80s, Menzel again returned to political activism and continued to make films though the mid-90s.