Jan Odl

The fairy tale begins in hell, where the book of sins has been lost. During his frantic search, the devil's apprentice Vašek finds a pair of shoes and, overcome by curiosity, decides to try them on. Like everything else associated with hell, these shoes are not ordinary, and Vašek suddenly finds himself in the world of humans. Before he has time to get his bearings, he loses them, and with them the chance to return. The shoes have caught the eye of a village boy named Jiřík, and they have brought him to hell instead. Lucifer is furious, because his realm has never faced such a predicament: an innocent child in hell and an inexperienced devil's apprentice accidentally left in the world...

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This production of Ostrava TV Studios was inspired by actual events which occurred in the Ostrava region of Moravia during the 1920s and 1930s. A hedonistic bon vivant of a lawyer named Zajícek (played by Václav Postránecký) came up with a sophisticated finance speculation scheme which exceeded the bounds of law. When discovered it became one of the most closely-followed First Republic scandals.

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A poor couple waits in vain for a child. The desperate man asks hell itself for help, and the devils grant his wish. Nine months later, the couple gives birth to a son named Nesyta. When he grows up, he sets out into the world. He is not afraid of work and offers help wherever he can, but he discourages everyone with his insatiability. Eventually, he enters the service of the devil himself...

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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...

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A dark comedy about a murder and its consequences presented in a backwards manner, where death is actually a rebirth. The film starts with an "execution" of the main protagonist and goes back to explore his previous actions and motivations.

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High school students experience the everyday worries of their age - they prepare for their high school graduation, go on a production internship at an engineering plant, and compete for a ski trip to the Krkonoše Mountains...

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An insight into the lives of adolescents, it is about an ordinary boy who falls in love with a student. But soon he faces a serious rival in the form of a local seducer...

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Three separate short stories by Jan Drda from the collection The Dumb Barricade: The Dynamite Watchman, Hatred and Traces.

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A group of jolly young people work in the Prague Tesla factory, also spending most of their leisure time together. One of them, guitar player Zdenek, begins to shun his friends' company. He has fallen in love with Vera, who does not belong to the group. The happy-go-lucky young man already has several acquaintances and has his own method to get a girl: to take his motorcycle, his guitar and a bottle of wine and take her to a rented houseboat. Vera, however, is different and gets angry at Zdenek. But she is fond of him and thus eventually spends a whole evening with him on the houseboat. At a preventative medical examination, the doctor tells Vera she is pregnant.

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A musical comedy about two indistinguishably similar siblings who love music, but each of them is completely different. Pavel Fořt is a professor of classical music at a pedagogical institute, his brother is a jazz musician and plays music in America. When the twin brother suddenly appears in Prague, they switch roles.

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The family is connected with Prague's "Kolbenka", the ČKD locomotive factory. Grandfather Antonín, already retired, son Rudolf, a master in the locomotive assembly section and grandson Antonín, a promising football player. The film also tells the story of Rudolf's daughter Vera - each generation has its own ideas about life and cannot identify with the others. The film is linked by retrospective sequences from the lives of Antonín the Elder and Rudolf, especially from the war years. It is a realistic take on working-class life, unencumbered by ideology (despite the opening dedication), featuring well-known and time-tested actors in mainly male roles.

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This early short by Jaromil Jireš anticipates the formal and stylistic experimentation that would characterize VALERIE AND HER WEEK OF WONDERS.

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Set in a village, the story of a simple-minded, not-so-responsible young man who still manages to take care of his younger siblings after their father has left the family. Good thing he could lean on the principles of exemplary socialist morality. Not surprisingly, the attempt to capture something of the mentality and conditions of the contemporary village breaks down into simple, poster-like lessons.

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