Bestiář

For some reason, I used to really like this movie, but unfortunately, it's not such a big deal anymore after all these years. Even that Novel for Women is better.. 60% (21.11.2020)

Bestiarium is a fitting name for this film. The audience had to suffer severe atrocities, and I was glad that I had never been struck by the idea of ​​reading the book on which it was based. The heroine was a total moron. My guess is that Barbara Nesvadbová loved Sex and the City and this is what she had learned from it. What a piece of crap. Right at the beginning, when it was getting windy and rainy, I was fascinated by how Karolína was carrying papers in one shot, which mysteriously disappeared in the next, only to appear again in the end, that was impressive. Well, at least I could take a ride in a Seat, listen to Impuls Radio, and look at the complete line of Avon products in Etzler’s bathroom. (23.04.2020)

Although I am of male sex, I have read two books by Barbara Nesvadbová and I devoured them during two train journeys. When a film adaptation of a literary work comes to cinemas, I like to read it first. In this case, I think the director didn't mess anything up. I just don't understand why the author insisted on casting Ester Geislerová in the main role, Danica Jurčová is a much more interesting type. (14.10.2007)

This is the exact opposite of From Subway with Love. There’s no probe into life itself, just purely entertaining cinematic reality. I can appreciate Pavlásková's films, and I'm still coming to terms with the author of the book, but I'm beginning to think that Pavlásková did a better job. ;) After reading a few of the books, I may be able to evaluate Barbara Nesvadbová's work a bit more widely than others who gossip without even touching her books. Barbara's admittedly autobiographical heroine in many ways sails through the slim books without any ambition to become a movie heroine, and it shows. However, something else happened, and the private accounts of the intimate life of Karolina from Vinohrady rapidly change in seriousness. When I finish reading the author's entire work, I will probably evaluate it in the way that a book is a book and a film is a film, and in this case, they complement each other perfectly because what I missed in reading, I supplemented with the movie theater experience. And what I missed in the movie theater, I supplemented it with literature. So far, I have at least discerned the differences in the film script that have given way to the actors and the producers' ideas (the politician Marek Vašut and his classmate Kryštof Hádek in particular) and those that are the same everywhere down to the smallest detail (the ironic widow episode of Miroslav Etzler). (17.02.2009)

***Spoiler alert*** A lifelike motif of an unequal relationship that, due to unhappy screenwriting choices, unexpectedly hits rock bottom very quickly. And in retrospect, I have to admit that I am truly disappointed by such a development. I couldn't believe it when Karolína accepted Alex's invitation to Italy and I had to experience all those beach encounters, sex on the rocks, and unspoken non-intimacy with them. And for a while, I still had this pseudo-genre of "Czech sexual drama" under my skin in a strange way. Maybe I'm getting old, but it was right here that I realized that even in Czech cinema, life truths can be found, and Jitka Čvančarová's answer, "But you want everything: love, passion, intellect, it's impossible," I unintentionally repeated for a while. Everything ended with the second breakup and Karolína's transformation into a "monster". Suddenly, everything becomes superficial and starts to play out in a clichéd manner. That's why there's no chance to see the character of Marek because he's just a "womanizer who likes cows", the same goes for the horribly written and performed character of the minister, who remains in most people's minds as "Marek Vašut acts like an idiot and wears a peacock tail". And the main heroine makes her way through all of this until the end, which once again picks up such a quick pace that I could barely blink. I was prepared, however reluctantly, to accept this bizarre happy ending, to reconcile with the film and the previous swapping of everything that walks and wears pants, and even forgive. But in the end, the creators managed to completely destroy everything that had been said up until that point. And in the last minute, in fact, the last sentence. I don't believe in this. From a romantic drama to a super awkward attempt at comedy and then to a feminist torch of hope? Viewers with freshly broken hearts may welcome this ending as a new horizon, but others must feel this calculating move as betrayal. (05.10.2008)