Movies: Jan Němec

Successful surgeon Tomas leaves Prague for an operation, meets a young photographer named Tereza, and brings her back with him. Tereza is surprised to learn that Tomas is already having an affair with the bohemian Sabina, but when the Soviet invasion...

A manifesto of sorts for the Czech New Wave, this five-part anthology shows off the breadth of expression and the versatility of the movement’s directors. Based on stories by the legendary writer Bohumil Hrabal, the shorts range from the surreally ch...

A labyrinthine portrait of Czech culture on the brink of a new millennium. Egon Bondy prophesies a capitalist inferno, Jim Čert admits to collaborating with the secret police, Jaroslav Foglar can’t find a bottle-opener, and Ivan Diviš makes observati...

A picnic is rudely transformed into a lesson in political hierarchy when a handful of mysterious authority figures show up....

An adaptation of Franz Kafka's classic story about Gregor Samsa, a man who awakes and sees himself suddenly turned into a repulsive insect....

Young director Honza David films the Russian invasion in in Prague in August 1968. With Eva the love of his life he tries to get out of the country. He wants to bring the explosive material to Vienna, to the director of the Austrian Television Helmut...

Two Jewish boys escape from a train transporting them from one concentration camp to another. Ultimately, they are hunted down by a group of old, armed home-guardists....

...

Comedy with fairy-tale touches, about Kate, who wants to marry, and Mr. Devil, who is not interested in the heart or soul of this passionate and aging lady, but is interested in her good cooking – for Mr. Devil is a glutton....

'68 covers exactly one year (January 1st through December 31st) in the lives of Zoltan Szabo and his family, Hungarian immigrants, working hard to make a life in San Francisco in 1968. The Szabos tries to adjust to the new country, changing times and...

It's nighttime in Prague, 21 August 1968. Soviet troops and tanks are occupying the city - random attacks, soldiers shooting, bodies lying dead on the sidewalk. With an impromptu crew, the director (Karel Roden) captures some unique evidence - materi...

Jan Nemec, a leading filmmaker of the Czech New Wave, creates an original portrait of one of the most provocative artists of the 20th century: Toyen (Marie Cerminova). As a female artist, Toyen broke through the male-dominated art world to create pai...

Based on a novel by Maria Majerova, this well-photographed but routine romantic drama is directed and co-scripted by Vaclav Krska. Set in a more old-fashioned time, the story centers around Lenka (Suzana Fisarskova), a young woman with a domineering,...

This three-part ballad, which often uses music to stand in for dialogue, remains the most perfect embodiment of Nemec’s vision of a film world independent of reality. Mounting a defense of timid, inhibited, clumsy, and unsuccessful individuals, the t...

A visual dreamscape of Prague streets, a hallucinatory vision of a world from the operating table for robotic heart surgeries, collaged together with the stories narrated by the mysterious Dr. B, who is a gifted surgeon at the centre of a conspiracy ...

The subject of this film, which takes an analytical look at the life of all of us with an analytical eye, is the evil microbe that has slowly infiltrated the organism of the Czech nation. Through the intertwining fates of three couples, it evokes dom...

The film tells the life story of its director, Jan Nemec, one of the most known and important filmmakers of Czech New Wave....

...

Taking a cue from Franz Kafka's "Letter to My Father," this highly personal film follows Czech director Jan Nemec as he attempts to engage in a dialogue with his deceased mother. While alive, Nemec's mother had a troubled relationship with her son; t...

Ester Krumbachová - a costume designer, screenwriter, director; one of the boldest personalities of the Czech New Wave. She worked in theatre, she was a writer and an illustrator. She co-created films such as O slavnosti a hostech (1966), Sedmikrásky...