What’s the Matter With You, Doctor?

In the mid-1980s, director Vít Olmer exploited the acting charisma of Zdeněk Svěrák in two interesting tragicomedies. After Co je vám, doktore? (What’s the Matter With You, Doctor?, 1984), they made another film together – Jako jed (As Good as Poison, 1985), although Svěrák did not contribute as a screenwriter the second time around. The first of these films brings together the qualities that made Zdeněk Svěrák one of the most interesting contemporary writers. In the tragicomedy What’s the Matter With You, Doctor? He wrote the role of the protagonist for himself – an idealistic, humble man who uses a humorous outlook to compensate for his dissatisfaction with external realities. However, as the problems of the 40-year-old dentist, Burda, exacerbate, he is moved to revolt against his current way of life. The desire to live a simple life in the countryside, leads the technophobic hero to move from the big city to the mountains in the company of a new, younger woman, whose outlook means she is more suited to him than his present wife. But this idealistic escape to the “purity” of nature ends in a realistic fashion – with a return to the city. Nonetheless, like most of Svěrák’s characters, the hero finds new hope in the birth of a child. The theme of “escaping from the city” resonates most strongly in Czech cinema in the work of director Tomáš Vorel, but Olmer’s film already presages several elements that are specific to the given topic. The timeless concept of the film What’s the Matter With You, Doctor? is a lot more than just a period piece of ecological agitprop made in accordance with the priorities of a socialist state. Burda the dentist is a Svěrák prototype – a passive, ordinary man who tries to turn his half-hearted dreams into reality. A society focused on material pleasures, however, does not suit his introverted nature in any era. Consequently, even years later, What’s the Matter With You, Doctor? offers a percipient, albeit affectionate insight into the heart of the Czech soul. As “Burda’s women”, Zdeněk Svěrák is successfully assisted by Iva Hüttnerová (Blanka) and Ivona Krajčovičová (Tereza).