Wild Flowers (2000)

I just want to explain (especially to Murushi), that the director does not hate woman and children :o) its's simply so, that the original stories (ballads/folk-tales not fairy tales..) are really cruel and dark.. Director gave these stories a bit modern view, e.g. Vodnik (Waterman) is more a romantic story than a horror story.. He cries in the end so as the girl does. It shows him as a hot-tempered man doing this all in affect and grieving for what he has done. I just try to translate you the original end of this story from the book (if you don't mind - its a clear spoiler :o): Written by K.J.Erben in 1853, according to the old folklore stories in a romanticism style:"Two things they lie in blood here-frisson goes through the back:a child's head without a body a body without a head" Please, excuse my bad English :o)), but you see there is no place for sorrow in this story.. I just want to explain, that these stories are dark in their original but Brabec gave them a new and colorful face and maybe changed a bit our view of these stories (which our people knew from the basic school). I know these stories from my mother, she knows it from her mother and so on.. They even knew some of these poems whole by heart according to the book and were telling them to us when we were children :o) My granny's parents and her grand parents were telling these stories in winter time, when there was cold outside (and TV was no invented yet) and they wanted to have some fun :o)

F.A. Brabec did an amazing job of directing "Kytice" (wildflowers), which is based on the book "the Seven Ballads". I'm not familiar with the novel, but I must say that the seven Czech fairy tales within the film are extremely nightmarish. These are not fairy tales to read to children before bedtime. One tale concerns an underwater spirit, who takes women captive as wives, if they happen to fall in the water. Another has a girl praying for her boyfriend to return from the dead. He returns in soldier uniform and gives her the power to fly every time she denounces her religious faith. The stories teach bizarre moral lessons, and people end up paying for their bad choices. The cinematography is gorgeous, and should be studied by film students everywhere. The movie is dark, but very moving and filled with colorful life. Jakubisko's art direction is amazing. (he helped produce the film along with his wife) The soundtrack is haunting and will stay with you long after the film is over. In fact I ended up buying the soundtrack, and it is excellent. "Kytice" reminds me of Kurasawa's "Dreams", "Big Fish" and "Valerie and her Week of Wonders" all rolled into one bizarre dream. The Czech Republic is a country thats film industry remains undiscovered by western audiences. I have yet to watch a Czech film that I didn't like. For more dark unsettling Czech folk lore also view Jakubisko's "An Ambiguous Report about the end of the World".

I think the movie is absolutely great. I got stuck by the camera and stories that every Czech know from the primary school so good. Camera is amazing, somewhat like "Hidden dragon crouching tiger". Next thing which stunned me was a music and I knew I must have the OST. Actors were pretty good, I don't know what the writer of the before comment was awaiting. It is more an epic play made of Erben's verses than a movie. Story is not narrated only by the actor's performance, but also by the mood of scenes (colours, music, costumes). One must think a little more as it isn't an action movie. Though some action can be found there too. With exception of the last story which is incomprehensible without knowing the original poem, remaining parts are simply perfect.

Like the guy from Alaska, I just came back from Europe this winter vacation, and in my stay at Prague I saw this movie. I had been seeing movies in all the countries I visited just to get a feel for their cinema (these are all non-subtitled foreign films i couldnt understand a word of), Schule in Germany, MeseAuto in Hungary, Billy Elliot in Austria and this.This film was extraodinary. The interestin thing is that we never understood any of the other movies and just had to figure things out from the visuals, like watching TV on mute. But this movie had very little dialogue anyway, so it didnt matter. I found myself overwhelmed by the cinematography. It reminded me a lot of Akira Kurosawa's Dreams.As far as I know, there was a famous poet who wrote 15 short stories, and this film is 7 of them (complete with 7 candles that one by one get blown out before each story). I'm not sure, but I took this to be a little like the movie Seven, where each candle, and thus, each story, represents one of the seven deadly sins. But because there were 15 stories in all, I'm not sure how well this theory holds up.This is an incredible movie to try to pick apart. THere is so much symbolism and there is no language barrier. If you ever make it to the Czech Republic or Prague, specifically, check this movie out.