The third full-length directorial attempt of former stuntman Petr Jákl – Jan Žižka, went down in history as the most expensive film. The budget is usually stated between 450 and 500 million crowns, or between 20 and 23 million dollars. However, he did not finish first in attendance. In the first weekend, it was visited by exactly 114,244 viewers, so the sales amount to 18.8 million crowns, while pre-premieres are also included. From this year’s selection of cinemas, the never-defeated warlord was defeated not only by superheroes, but also by others Doctor Strange subtitled In the Multiverse of Madness and the fourth Thor, which is subtitled Love as Thunder. But the owner also gave him a Lavi, because the audience preferred comedy Vyšehrad: Fylmwhich they knew from the serial version available on the Internet, before telling the story of the birth of a national hero.
In America, the film was a hit 810 thousand dollars (just over 19 million crowns). While in the Czech Republic it was fourth in attendance in terms of openers for the entire year, in the United States, it was as high as 14th in weekend sales. Even before the release, the number of screens on which he could be seen in America had decreased to around 1,300. Petr Jákl argues that, on the one hand, Žižka is not well-known abroad, so there is not that much interest, and on the other hand, proper promotion for foreign markets would cost more , than what was the budget of the most expensive Czech film at the end, which was decided not to undergo. Those with bad language would rather claim that, in addition to economic factors, the lack of interest is due to the fact that the name Medieval is not attractive enough, that the last wave of historical spectacles and interest in them was less than two decades ago, and that the rather negative audience and critical acclaim. The release on streaming platforms will probably be earlier than expected.
According to the historian and critic Marie Barešová, the film is schizophrenic: on the one hand, it is ambitious in its attempt to break into international waters, on the other hand, it deals with a Czech historical figure and is more for the Czech audience. According to her, she tries to balance both, and so perhaps resigns herself to broader connections and has a didactic beginning. He considers that “a historical costume film in Czech conditions cannot compete with large foreign productions” and that “by American standards, a cheap film will look funny next to Hollywood blockbusters”. Marek agrees with her at least on this point, because Jan Žižka seems like a title intended directly for the video market, such as those published at the end of the last century and at the beginning of this century. They were available for loan when the spectacle on which this videotape was parasitizing was just going to be released – and Jan Žižka is extracting Braveheart, The Last Samurai, Gladiator, etc., and so he got stuck somewhere in the cinematographic past.
Mary gives Jan Žižek accommodating 70 %although probably with a narrowed eye on the one-eyed warlord, and Marek refrains from the evaluation for reasons of self-preservation, because, unlike Jákl, he did not do judo.
The ageless Zlatan
Marek would rather recommend another European biography, namely I’m Zlatan. Unlike Jan Žižka, the Swedish legend did not kidnap women or kill anyone as a mercenary (we hope!), but the famous man is very good at kicking a round object and hitting a rectangular target. Even so much so that he won eight league titles in a row from 2003-2011, was the top scorer in Serie A in two clubs and the top scorer in the Swedish national team. A film based on an (auto)biographical book I am Zlatan Ibrahimović David Lagercrantz and Zlatan Ibrahimović himself, is introduced to Czech cinemas by the new distribution company Vertigo International, which has set itself the goal of distributing quality European films. And Zlatan is like that, according to both Mark and Marie. They agree in particular that it is also this is not a conventional biographical spectacle. On the one hand, we have a narrative in two timelines, more contemporary and more distant in the past, charting childhood and adolescence, which is common for movies about famous people. On the other hand, we do not follow the top achievements, but rather focus on childhood and adolescence, and thus approach a social drama and a work about the coming of age of someone who never actually grew up.
Marie, who breaks stereotypes because she knows more about sports than Marek, would I’m Zlatan carry 60 %. Marek would round the assessment to 70 %.
Prized River
Marie could still see River, the second part of a free documentary trilogy, the first part of which Hora was also shown in cinemas in our country thanks to the AČFK. Jennifer Peedom, acclaimed and experienced director of naturalistic nonfiction (Sherpa, A miracle on Everest), she collaborated for the first time with someone else: Joseph Nizeti. And the music was once again composed by the Australian Symphony Orchestra, with Peedom enlisting musician Johnny Greenwood from Radiohead and she chose the well-known actor Willem Dafoe as the narrator-commentator. The river, which has very positive reviews from around the world (Russia, Germany, the United States), did not like Maria that much: “A classic documentary in which images are sequenced, accompanied by an off-screen commentary by Willem Dafoe,” she assessed dryly. She especially disliked pathos and excessive appeal to what we leave to future generations. The images of the various river currents, both newly shot and archival, are beautiful and command admiration and respect, but the condemnations of human and technological interference in nature and the flow of rivers was suffocating despite its short length.
V River it, um, says that we share our destiny with rivers, we flow together, and that to think like a river is to dream in the flow of time. But Marie doesn’t think like a river, so she fenced in 60 %.
If you are interested in how the individual edited and audio versions of Jan Žižka differ and how the presenter and the presenter discuss and evaluate the expected Jáklův flák for a good two dozen minutes, listen to/watch Kulový Blesk: