Summary
In 1971, writer-director Jiří Hanibal filmed this attempt at bringing to life the emotional problems of a group of young Czechs living in the countryside. Honza returns home from the army for three days during the Easter break to be with his parents. But he finds himself caught up in a love triangle, involving the fickle girl Marta and the dreamy student Ivan. Marta tries to maintain the attentions of Honza, while at the same time continuing her dalliance with Ivan. The wily Marta views Ivan as being too naive, but still gets a kick out of his attempts to woo her... This relationship drama eschews much of the subtlety, authenticity and complexity found in many similar relationship dramas of the 1960s. Only director Jiří Hanibal’s casting of the debuting actors Vanda Švarcová (Marta), Vítězslav Jandák (Ivan) and the little-known Petr Skarke (Honza) evokes anything of the spirit of the Czechoslovak New Wave, a movement that had been extinguished by the time of this film’s release.
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