A comedy for the ages.
A wry, bittersweet comedy in the classic Czech tradition, Vladimir Michálek's Autumn spring stars the great Vlastimil Brodský as Fanda, an old man who refuses to grow up.
Despite pleas from his exasperated wife Emilie (Stella Zázvorková) and son Jara (Ondrej Vetchý), who want him to make some serious decisions about the future, Fanda ignores their nagging and spends his days seeking amusement and adventure. Aided and abetted by his longtime pal and former theatre colleague Eda (Stanislav Zindulka), Fanda keeps his acting skills sharpened by pretending to be a host of fascinating characters. One day he is a retired opera star in the market for an opulent country estate, next a ticket inspector on the Prague subway. Although Fanda bickersconstantly with his wife, their bond is palpable - even if life with Fanda is frustrating, deep down Emilie also knows that at least it is never boring. But when Fanda fakes his own death, terrifying his family, Emilie decides she's had enough and files for divorce. The couple soon realises, however, that maybe Fanda is right - instead of old age being a time to take on worries, perhaps it is the time to shed them and live each day to the fullest.
Special Agent Matti
*
M (Low level coarse language, adult themes)
102 minutes (1:42 hours)
Film: 22 July 2004
For a couple of days I just walked around the desk but gradually old memories started to arise in my head, memories of my childhood when my grandparents looked after me, and memories of different people who I have met in my life and who have somehow influenced me. At this moment I realised that all these people were actually much older than me, sometimes even by several generations. In my eyes, my generation was always the generation that was born only for fulfilling some kind of strange evolutionary function. Our period was dark, flavorless and odourless and if it weren't for the older people it would have been a generation completely lost.
And then, suddenly, the script began to come alive for me. Next came a fateful meeting with Vlastimil Brodský, my country's most beloved actor, and I realised that this man had been accompanying me my whole life. As a child I used to listen to his goodnight stories on the radio; his kind voice helped dispel my first nightmares. Then there was TV, my teenage years and along with that came films starring Mr Brodský such as Closely watched trains and All my good countrymen and then the Russian tanks arrived and we prematurely matured into a time that strived to suffocate us. Like an apparition, an East-German film showed up called Jacob the liar and at home there were illicit screenings of Larks on a string and then twenty years went by during which I hardly saw Mr Brodský in anything special. And now, suddenly, I was sitting in front of him, not knowing what to say, what to do what could I be saying to him? I am sure he felt my unease. He vanished, returning after a moment with the script, carefully highlighted and underlined, in one hand, and a pad full of notes in the other. With a brat's smile he said, "I was quite nervous because of you and so I thought I better be properly prepared. So shall we start?"
I pulled out my copy of the script, also heavily underlined, and said, "Sorry, but what can sometimes really bother me is pathos and..." "Sentimentality," Mr Brodsky immediately added and at that moment we knew we were seeing things similarly. And there, sitting in front of me, was a man with lively eyes and a prankish smile and I was happy to meet him finally after these forty years, for once again I could be the boy in front of the radio, having his nightmares dispelled by Mr Brodský.