Zlocin v santánu (1968) User Reviews

A rare and strange Menzel

[tony-70-667920 · 6/10 · 16 January 2021]

This was Menzel's third feature, made after "Closely Observed Trains" and "Capricious Summer", both classics. It's probably his least-known film, and the hardest to find on DVD. Having finally caught up with it, I can see why. It's a very curious mixture, being a blend of crime story, farce, musical and also a jibe at Czechoslovakia's Communist rulers. Klara (Eva Pilarova) is the star of a night club, which is visited regularly by the Minister of Justice (Vlastimil Brodsky), who brings her a bouquet of flowers every time. The storyline above is wrong: she isn't in love with him, but keeps resisting his advances, always conveyed by one of the comical thugs who accompany him. Klara's acrobat husband is abusive, and also performs at the club: his pathetic act, which consists of jumping up and down on a trampoline, could easily be performed by a young child. He's jealous of the magician, who's after Eva too. There are two crimes. When the Minister gives Klara a pearl necklace the magicician steals it, then plants it on a rather simple stagehand, Pepicek (Jiri Suchy) when things get hot. The magician gets stabbed in the back and Pepicek gets charged with both crimes. He's given a hopelessly incompetent public defender, Vilem (Jiri Slitr) who's in his forties but has just managed to qualify after 25 years as a student: worse than Kenneth More in "Doctor in The House." The musical element took me by surprise, but Czech audiences at the time will have probably been happy with it, as Pilarova, Suchy and Slitr were big names in Czech pop music in 1968. Suchy and Slitr were a duo, with Suchy writing the lyrics and Slitr the music. (Slitr, who died the following year, was a better looking version of Dudley Sutton. Ironically he'd qualified as a doctor of law from Charles University in Prague, the Czech Oxford, before switching to music.) These characters burst into song at the most inappropriate moments. Vilem goes to see Klara, but never gets round to asking her questions which might help his client, as having fallen for each other he and Klara spend their time singing a duet. Two characters even get to sing on the scaffold, having been granted that as a last request. The most interesting character is the minister. He hasn't been lusting after Klara. When she finally succumbs and gives him a private performance he gets into his hammock-like bed, has her sing and gently rock the bed, and goes to sleep sucking his thumb. As well as being infantile he's shown not keeping his side of the bargain which made her relent, and being a cheapskate: the pearls are fake, and purchased with state funds rather than his own. Apart from Brodsky the film features Menzel favourites such as Zdenek Sverak and ( too briefly) Rudolf Hrusinsky. It was presumably made during the Prague Spring, which was brought to an end by Soviet tanks in August '68. It is surprising that Menzel managed to get it released that December, but the next year he went too far with "Larks on a String", which showed quite rightly that the whole system was rotten, rather than one minister. That wasn't released until 1990, after the Velvet Revolution and the fall of Communism. After "Larks" Menzel had to wait five years before he could make another film.