Discoveries and Mistakes of Feature Film

In 2012, the hopeful production and stylistic trends heralded in the previous year by The House (Dom) and Apricot Island (Marhuľový ostrov) were confirmed. The hint of a certain continuous development of feature production lies not in any school, movement, stream or free grouping, but the authors’ poetics and genre preferences allow us to sense that feature film in Slovakia has gained its second wind.

The new releases announced for 2013 confirm the upward trend to date. The reasons can also be found in the functioning legislative framework for the support of cinema but, when looking at the budgets for the individual films, it is quite clear that the key to success in no way lies solely in the state subsidies.

Eight feature films with a Slovak majority share is just two more than in 2011; however, the more marked generation stratification and genre diversification merit attention. After a period domina-ted by intimate auteurist films, genre audience films became the hot assignment of 2012. The new generation of filmmakers that matured professionally in a cinematographic environment with almost no means, managed to create new production platforms. Three of last year’s films got no state funds for shooting (Evil, Angels, Immortalitas) and only one of them used the distribution subsidy (Angels). It is no surprise that D. N. A. Production was the signature beneath the two watchable items of these three guerrilla projects. In addition to art films this company also has several respected television productions in its portfolio.

With regard to genres, last year brought two new films: the horror Evil (Zlo) and the action sci-fi Immortalitas. Both were inspired by well-established Hollywood elements, but that is all they have in common. Evil is an exemplary genre exercise which maximises its effect with minimum means without making any contrived effort to make a statement. It spreads tension, it evokes fear and it winks conspiratorially at an informed viewer. It draws on the favourite found-footage procedures and motivates the emergence of a film by making a series about paranormal phenomena. This strategy has several advantages: it creates an impression of authenticity enhanced by shooting in real locations, it realistically motivates work with the space off-screen (Evil is shown only in hints or off-screen); it enhances the participation of the audience by means of the cinematographer who, in certain moments, moves from behind the camera to in front of it. Director Peter Bebjak works with quotations (e.g. The Blair Witch Project, The Shining, The Exorcist) in a self-reflective manner, he uses genre clichés with minimum special effects (e.g. a haunted house, holy water, a zombie) and from time to time he spices them up with humour – for instance when the two scary girls are taken away by their mother or when the rescued cinematographer returns in the end for his forgotten camera and pays for it – how else – with his life.

Immortalitas by director Erik Bošnák has been criticised so much that one is almost ashamed to “kick the corpse”. The film whose makers mostly still attend the Film and Television Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts could have been quite a nice amateur effort – as demonstrated by the stiff acting performances, awkwardly ridiculous special effects and the naïve and drama-turgically unfinished story. However, in such case, the film should not have pretended to be a metaphysical deliberation about the eternal fight between good and evil with a touch of the mystery of the four elements or the temptation in paradise. And, primarily, it should never have been put on general release. Paradoxically, this incomprehensible decision on the part of the company Film Europe has probably brought the filmmakers more damage than benefits.

Dancing on Broken Glass (Tanec medzi črepinami), by director, screenwriter and main protagonist Marek Ťapák, does not conquer any new genre territories but it returns to the socialist-realistic tradition of a musical – dancing folklore film. It thus pays tribute not only to our cultural heritage but also to the author’s father, actor, director and dancer, Martin Ťapák. Times have changed so he does this using a different ideological background and in a new garb. Instead of melding folklore with industrial motifs, Ťapák chose to link Slovak folk songs with world music. The film is based on a performance of the Slovak Folk Art Ensemble (SĽUK) of the same name and, in addition to the attractive musical arrangements, it also features photogenic panoramas of the Slovak countryside. However, it encounters the problem of transforming a stage performance into a film. The film is composed of non-homogeneous scenes and not even the poetic interfaces are able to link them into a more cohesive formal framework; instead of archetypal ideas emerging from the emotional memory of the protagonist, they become the shards of more or less inventive filmic solutions for capturing the individual choreographies. Despite the professional work of the camera, high-quality editing and the performances of the musicians and dancers, Dancing on Broken Glass is “folklore from a can” (Elo Havetta), substituting the authentic relationship to folk roots with sycophantic kitsch.

For years the comedy genre has represented a baptism of fire for Slovak filmmakers and only a few filmmakers have emerged from the fire without burns. The year 2012 brought one less unsuccessful and one extremely unsuccessful attempt at light summer comedy. Tigers in the City (Tigre v meste) by director Juraj Krasnohorský builds on several unconventional narrative ideas (e.g. casting an actress in the main male role or the multiple denouement of the story), mixing genres (romantic comedy and thriller) and attractive, even postcard or advertising visual solutions. The film was trailed as being new, funny, light, colourful, modern, original and with a happy ending, i.e. as a light colourful bubble. But when this bubble bursts, the impression it leaves is mixed. A “message” would not be fit for the Tigers in the City, but the over-frivolous approach to the script resulted in losing the more consequential points of situations, hence audiences with a more advanced film literacy, capable of multi-layer understanding, may have lost interest in playing the game which only pretends to be intelligent.

Unfortunately, So Fine (Tak fajn) might have better served solely as an exploitation of the soundtrack on commercial radio which usually selects the lousiest trash from local music production. In So Fine you can find all that trash nicely added to the “feel good” clip sequences. Director, cinematographer and screenwriter Pavol Janík Jr. based his script on a collection of holiday anecdotes and made a film in which “everyone who ever spent a holiday at the seaside can find him/herself”. The quality of the story of the three friends who go on holiday together and where, despite all the twists and turns, everything ends well, matches this strategy of the director. The author has really missed the point because, in addition to the simple plot, characters and physical humour, he can only provide predictable punch-lines (e.g. throwing stones or the sea urchin in the shower). These cannot be saved, not even by the details of the enormous bosom of the main female protagonist or the grimaces of the male protagonists.

Angels (Anjeli) by Róbert Šveda was named as a gay film for depicting the romantic relationship between two men. This is somewhat simplistic because, if the lovers were heterosexual, not a lot would change. While Šveda’s début Demons (Démoni) was a film about the demons of love, Angels are primarily about dying, hence also about the final things in life. The film which was made as a divertissement amongst friends whilst waiting to make Čubirková was filmed in non-standard form as a video on digital single-lens reflex cameras. Despite this, the filmmakers managed to not only achieve a visual balance but also the intimacy of a chamber drama. This intimacy is not disturbed, rather enhanced by the references to the director’s other projects and role models (most evident are the links to Bergman and his Cries and Whispers and to Shake­speare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream), as well as Biblical allusions. This transforms Angels into a personal film which draws the audience into the author’s universe. However, the unbalanced emotional narrative tone, at times gently hinting, at others exulting, does not suit the film, nor does the senseless over-simplification of the ending.

Juraj Nvota dealt with the topic of normalisa-tion in Music (Muzika) and he returned to the same period with his film Confidant (eŠteBák) – the story of a man who involuntarily becomes the instrument and opponent of power. He builds his story in particular on the attractive casting and standard quality of filmmaking. The genre characteristic “bitter comedy” equates to a softening view of the past. The story is based on authentic archive materials, but it shows only a deformed cliché. It was intended primarily for a young audience who did not experience the communist era but instead of offering an understanding of history, the film affords only a naïve distortion of the past (wiretapping of the writer), vulgar schemes (luxury goods bought in special shops using convertible-currency vouchers or the communist concrete apartment buildings) and the unpardonable vindication of collaboration with the regime. It depicts the weakling, not dissimilar to Tóno Brtko from The Shop on Main Street (Obchod na korze), as an inconspicuous fighter against the regime(!).

The greatest discovery of the year is undoubtedly Iveta Grófová’s film Made in Ash (Až do mesta Aš) which veers inspirationally on the verge of feature, documentary and animated film. The final product was preceded first by honest documentary and subsequently by scriptwriting-dramaturgic preparation which balanced non-fiction scenes with non-actors with staged scenes. The rough story about young women from a socially disadvantaged environment who come to the town of Aš – the symbolic end of the (post-communist) world – solely to slave away first as seamstresses and then as mattresses for sex tourists, offers a painful view of the market aspects of human relations. Due to the non-expressiveness of the main character, the film has the potential to be close to the merciless observation of Ulrich Seidl, if it didn’t display allusive narration and if it didn’t penetrate the intimacy of emotions, dreams and desires of the main protagonist. Grófová managed to achieve a strange sensitivity thanks to the animated scenes which visualise the main hero’s inner world in a diary form. In turn, recordings from the web camera evoke the distance between separated lovers and the forlornness of the girl in the big world. Shots made with cell phones and discreetly aestheticised taciturn shots of intimate scenes subjectivise the narrative.

It appears that the honour of Slovak cinema is no longer borne solely by documentaries. Not only because documentary filmmakers are resorting more and more frequently to the expressive means of feature film but also because young female directors are making social dramas with a remarkably unsentimental sensibility and young male directors have found a way of putting a craft fine-tuned by commercial production into the service of the auteur cinema.


Katarína Mišíková