Marketa Lazarova

“This story almost remained untold. However, it deserves to be praised”: this is the succinct statement in the beginning of the film but also what, one could claim, applies to the film itself if we consider how elusive it’s been to this day. It’s almost futile to try to describe the labyrinthine, abstract plot of the epic “Marketa Lazarova”, which was born in Czechoslovakia, outside the limits of the then-leading New Wave. Illustrating a cyclone of constant confrontations between Christianity and paganism, duty and personal choices, survival and elements of nature, principles and the law of the powerful, Frantisek Vlacil switches points of view without warning in his restless filming and equates man and beast, constructing a universe that’s hostile as much as it’s dreamy and rooted in a nightmarish reality, which can only leave the unsuspecting viewer dumbfounded.

Director: Frantisek Vlacil

Screenwriter: Frantisek Pavlίcek, Frantisek Vlacil, Vladislav Vancura

DoP: Bedrich Batka

Music: Zdenek Liska

Editor: Miroslav Hajek

Principal Cast: Magda Vasaryova, Josef Kemr, Nada Hejna, Jaroslav Moucka, Frantisek Velecky, Karel Vasicek, Ivan Paluch

Country: Czechoslovakia

Year: 1967

Running Time: 158'

Language: Czech