A drunk writer meets a lonely professor. Spoiler: they still don't understand each other.
Young script-writer Frantisek (Petr Cepek) is hired to write a film script based on the successful novel Looking Back. He meets with the novel's female author, a University professor and writer named Olga Machová (Jirina Trebická), approximately ten-years-older than him. In the beginning, they do not understand each other at all. Frantisek is a skeptic experiencing a moral crisis, unsatisfied with both his work and his private life - he lives separated from his wife and has no deeper feelings for his numerous lovers. He even gets drunk from time to time and breaks the public peace. Olga is lonesome, too, but considers her life fulfilled.
Acting
Třebičká's devastating restraint vs. Čepek's chaotic energy
Direction
Máša's flashback structure that refuses easy answers
Writing
Dialogue that actually sounds like writers arguing
Director
Antonín Máša
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Made during the 1968 Soviet invasion aftermath, the film's spiritual paralysis mirrors a nation's.
Director Máša was banned from filmmaking shortly after; this was his first feature.
XC
