Themes: Totalitarian States, Crumbling Marriages, Political Corruption
Main Cast: Jirina Bohdalova, Radoslav Brzobohaty, Gustav Opocensky, Miloslav Holub, Lubor Tokos
Release Year: 1970
Country: CS
Run Time: 91 minutes
Plot
This highly-charged political satire from Czechoslovakia was banned for 20 years. It is the chronicle of a miserable marriage between a provincial bureaucrat and the boozy daughter of a pub-owner who find trouble when they learn through the grapevine that one of the husband's superior's has been arrested. Now the husband fears that a major purge is in the offing. Their fears are not allayed by the fact that their house keys have disappeared, nor can they shake the feeling that someone is watching them. Things don't get any better when they finally get into the house and find signs that someone has been in there. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
The film is about a bitter married couple that consists of Ludvik, a senior official of Prague's ruling Communist regime, and his alcoholic wife Anna. They return home after attending a political party dinner and notice their home has been broken into. Several strange occurrences, including the disappearance of their spare house keys and dead phone lines, lead them to believe that they are under surveillance by their own government. As the night progresses, the flaws of their marriage and of each other are exposed.
This film was withheld from circulation by the nation's ruling Communist party (who were supported by the occupying Soviet forces). It wasn't released until late 1989, around the time of Czechoslovakia's first democratic elections in over 40 years.
