Juraj Jakubisko’s innovative third feature is a surreal and fantastic work, although he prefers to call it absurd. Yorick (Jiri Sykora) plays the part of the fool in order to reject the cruelty of the adult world. A triangle develops involving his best friend, Andrzej (Philippe Avron), a Pole, and Marta (Magda Vaaaryova), a young Jewish womanoall orphans and a product of ‘the absurdity of our world’. The film’s complex web of game playing mixes comedy, tragedy, and farce. Made with a late sixties enthusiasm for experiment, the film uses parody and quotation, combining the influence of painting and folk art with frequent filmic references. The cinematography of Igor Luther (The Tin Drum, Danton) is striking and innovative and there is a rare use of the ‘dynamic frame’ (alteration in the dimensions and framing of images).
Czechoslovakia [Slovakia]/France, 1969 [release, 1990]. English subtitles. Colour. 78 min.