Summary
The protagonists of Věra Chytilová’s caustic character study are financially-secure thirty-somethings who enjoy boozing, getting up to hi-jinks and undertaking no-strings sexual escapades. Inspector Pepe (Tomáš Hanák), vet Dědek (Milan Šteindler) and restaurant manager František (David Vávra) are enjoying their life – until suddenly the impulsive Pepe collapses and ends up in hospital. It transpires that one of the group is HIV positive – and their hitherto joyfully shared promiscuity is replaced by the paranoid collapse of previously friendly relationships. In this film, Chytilová unequivocally skewers not just the moral decrepitude of the late 1980s, but also the incompatible relationships between men and women, two of the film’s core themes. The targets of her condemnation are both the stagnant official structures and the new ostentatiously non-conformist generation beset by boredom, alienation, amorality and spiritual hollowness. Chytilová collaborated with members of Prague’s Sklep theatre group, who brought elements of their own distinctive poetic style to the narrative.
