Prague
DVD/Blu-ray: A Case for a Rookie HangmanTuesday, 09 July 2019
The excellent booklet essay by Michael Brooke that accompanies this Second Run release of Pavel Juráček’s second, and final feature (it’s presented in a fine 4K restoration) tells us much about the director’s importance for the Czech New Wave, that... Read more... |
Blu-ray: Diamonds of the NightTuesday, 05 February 2019
The opening shot of Jan Němec’s 1964 debut feature, Diamonds of the Night, recalls the start of Orson Welles’s Touch of Evil. Němec’s camera also ducks and dives, here following a pair of teenagers fleeing from a moving train and escaping into a... Read more... |
Blu-ray: DaisiesFriday, 04 January 2019
Věra Chytilová’s 1966 film Daisies almost defies description, though what initially seems like 75 minutes of plot-free silliness does coalesce into something bordering on the coherent. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, to quote Seinfeld.... Read more... |
P.E.Caquet: The Bell of Treason review - the sacrifice of CzechoslovakiaSunday, 26 August 2018
It was 80 years ago next month that Neville Chamberlain returned with the good news of peace in our time. The Munich Agreement was greeted as a triumph for the appeasers. The price Britain had to pay was a minor stain on its conscience: the... Read more... |
Milos Forman: 'The less you know about yourself, the happier you are'Tuesday, 17 April 2018
The second thing I noticed about Miloš Forman, who has died at the age of 86, was the spectacular imperfection of his English. All those decades in America could not muffle his foghorn of a Bohemian accent, nor assimilate the refugees from Czech... Read more... |
McMafia, BBC One review - James Norton looks promising in a murky le Carré worldTuesday, 02 January 2018
It’s not the first time that James Norton has kicked off BBC One’s New Year primetime celebrations in Russian style. Two years ago, he was costumed up as the courageous Prince Andrei, in illustrious ensemble company for Andrew Davies and Tom Harper’... Read more... |
Proms at... & Prom 56 reviews: Multi-Story Orchestra / BBCSO, Hrůša - the best of all possible worldsMonday, 28 August 2017
There we had it, in one extraordinary Proms day: the brave new world of contemporary classical music for all in a repurposed Peckham car park followed by the consolidation of the old order in all-Czech programming of remarkable originality and... Read more... |
DVD/Blu-ray: The Fabulous Baron MunchausenFriday, 21 July 2017
Baron Munchausen’s exploits have been filmed before. Terry Gilliam’s star-studded 1988 version floundered thanks to a sub-par script, and there’s an infamous 1943 German adaptation, commissioned by Goebbels. This one, Karel Zeman’s The Fabulous... Read more... |
'You are my hero, dear Jiří': Karita Mattila and others remember Jiří BělohlávekWednesday, 07 June 2017
The first of Jiří Bělohlávek’s final three appearances in London, conducting his Czech Philharmonic in a concert performance of Janáček’s Jenůfa, came as a shock. The trademark grey curly hair had vanished. Clearly he had undergone chemotherapy, but... Read more... |
theartsdesk Q&A: Conductor Jakub HrůšaSaturday, 04 February 2017
Only four flutes were on stage at the start of Jakub Hrůša’s latest concert with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, the reins of which he took over from Jonathan Nott last September. Charles Ives would have been amazed to hear his “Voices of Druids” on... Read more... |
Jenůfa, English National OperaFriday, 24 June 2016
ENO's new artistic director Daniel Kramer must regret having gone on BBC Radio 4's Start the Week to talk about suspending Janáček "and other obscures" from the company's repertoire for several seasons to come. Good God, if Jenůfa, Janáček's first... Read more... |
The Cunning Little Vixen, GlyndebourneMonday, 13 June 2016
Is The Cunning Little Vixen a jolly children’s pantomime, or is it a searching study of issues of life and death, Man and Nature? The answer, naturally, is that it’s both. Children dress up as animals, and sing and prance about. But at the same time... Read more... |
