User Reviews

Ahhh! The joys of the simple life....Yes, go hand-in-hand with the joys of a simple movie! Watching films from MANY different countries is an absolutely enthralling endeavor! Each nation's films tend to exhibit a peculiar cultural signature spin, that is a delightfully intriguing puzzle, waiting to be deciphered and savored. An appetite for Czech films is, however, undoubtedly an acquired taste.

Let me share some of the things that made TEACHER such a cinematic plum. Very In-Your-Face, but without ever trying in the least to be, is the physical appearance of the actors themselves. WOW! Talk about the antithesis incarnate of the 2 hours per day at the gym, capped-teeth-multiple-plastic-surgery-and-hair-implant, monthly-Botox-injections "LOOK" that seems to be practically the norm in Hollywood...This cast looks like they were sent from "Real-People'R'US", after dropping out of their weekly ReHab meetings!

Also, there were a couple moments in the film where I began feeling somewhat uncomfortable with the direction the movie began to go in, but before this discomfort escalated into something more serious, the movie veered off in a pleasantly unexpected direction! No formulaic Hollywood fluff, here...NO Siree, Bob!

Two cultural notes: Boy, these Czechs sure are at ease with nudity! People running around nude in the house, Hey, doesn't raise an eyebrow! Also, people are ever so cooperative with official government policy! Government says "No more discrimination against gays in the workplace!" and its: "DAH! Dee government says vee must do dis, so vee are on board...OK!" One pleasant and unexpected surprise...The Czech folk(?)music! Very soothing and haunting melodies. I'll have to ask some of my Czech students to fill me in! Be sure not to miss it! Recommended by a Friend...

8*STARS*....ENJOY/DISFRUTELA!

Any comments, questions or observations, in English or Español, are most welcome!

This somewhat ironically titled Czech film, dubbed Best Queer Film at the 2008 Reykjavík Film Festival, depicts the experiences of a confused gay schoolteacher who moves from Prague to the country and falls in love with a straight teenager. He's not a country teacher. He is someone who has left the faculty of an elite school in the capital because it's too much dominated by his talented mother (Zuzana Bydžovská) and because he's broken up with his boyfriend, whom he never really loved. Presumably he's also on the run from his gayness, since he hides it now. The principal of the country school (Cyril Drozda) knows he's messed up somehow to end up here, and predicts he'll last no more than six months.

That's before the pensive Petr (Pavel Liska), who looks perpetually befuddled or depressed, runs into Marie (Zuzana Bydzovská), a weather-beaten widow with red hair and good bone structure, and her son Lada (Ladislav Sedivý), a beautiful, lanky youth who looks like a male model but thinks himself a loser. Together Marie and Lada run a dairy farm. Petr's new milieu is rugged, and the women are blunt and the men are blunter. There's much drunkenness on view, with smoking of joints, quaffing of beers and downing of shots, but no sign of fun, except when Lada's making out in the hay with his girlfriends, who don't stick with him long.

Despite emotional paralysis, Petr's physically quite presentable, and Marie signals interest at once, but he brushes her off. The reaction is similar but much stronger when, after much delay and and against his better judgment, he makes a pass at Lada. His former boyfriend (Marek Daniel) shows up in a fast red car, a yuppie headhunter who now lives in Germany. He again is rejected, and surprisingly runs off with Lada's girl.

Things go back and forth after that. Somehow when the film had barely begun I was reminded of Penelope Gilliatt's bittersweet screenplay for John Schlesinger's Sunday Bloody Sunday. The plots are utterly different, but there is the same focus on sexual ambivalence and compromise. The way The Country Teacher is resolved is all about making do.

Petr teachers his class about nature, and there are some none-too-subtle messages in what he has to say to his students at the film's beginning and end about, of all things, snails. Two calves' birthings also, one stillborn, one successful, have a similarly pointed message to convey. Why are Marie, Petr, and Lada all still together at the end after all that has happened? Surely not just to help a cow give birth. No, it's just that "everybody needs somebody," as Marie intones.

A sequence when Petr briefly revisits his parents in Prague and comes out to his high-powered mother, by way of explaining why he is not sorry a former girlfriend has married, seems from another more sophisticated movie, especially in the subtle way Petr and his bee-keeper father (Miroslav Krobot) interact.

Petr and Lada have both run off, and both come back. Petr surprises the country school principal by deciding to stay on after all, and when they express delight he pointedly tells them, "What if you were to know that I am homosexual?" Ah, well, that's an accepted thing now, the principal says, after a pause, and the woman teacher who's been hitting on Petr gulps and agrees. Perhaps Petr is growing out of being a self-hating homosexual. Still, Sláma has not indicated that he has prospects for a gay life in this rural setting (he may, but there's no hint of it).

Despite its frustrating half-a-loaf ending, The Country Teacher inspires sympathy for its main characters and makes them come to (limited) life. Too bad that Petr is such a doofus and that the film has only one strong, risky moment. Minor characters seem somewhat one-dimensional. This lacks the chaotic richness of Slama's 2005 'Something Like Happiness,' but in return it's a lot more clearly focused. At times the use of modern classical music is obtrusive, especially when Petr is tutoring the teenage Lada, who after all likes only loud rock and video games. Perhaps the art music is meant to tell us Petr is out of tune with the boy, but he's out of tune with us at that point too. We've had enough.

In limited US theatrical release (March following 2009), 'The Country Teacher'/'Venkovský ucitel' will be issued on US DVD September 9, 2009.

The introverted Petr (Pavel Listka) arrives in a little Czech village to take the job of biology teacher at the local school. As Petr was raised in a teachers' family in Prague, we are led to wonder what he is looking for, or running from, in this secluded corner of the world. Contrary to expectation, he seems to be finding a place for himself. Again, contrary to expectation, it is all a little more perverse than you might expect.

As in director Slama's previous film, Something Like Happiness, the weight of depression looms over the characters. But it is not an unhappiness provoked by external factors (of say a job or poverty) but rather by the passions of the characters themselves. They are pushed in a direction which is not necessarily the "right" direction for them, and at the expense of themselves or others. Ridicule is no obstacle for the drunken suitor of the cow herder Maria, nor is humiliation for the young lover Lada. The characters do not have a self-control over their passions, falling victim to irrational needs which separate the civilized from the brutes. We could been tempted to attribute their lack of self-control to their provinciality, but our guide in this remote world, the educated Petr himself, is no stranger to weakness.

As we watch the story unfold amongst the birds and the bees, making up our minds as to why Petr is in that village and gaining an understanding of the side characters, I can not help but feel that the whole tragedy remains unconvincing. It is the great challenge of literature and cinema to render improbable relationships credible, but when you lift yourself out of the tale to calibrate, the discord becomes apparent. Or maybe we should ask ourselves if pardon should really be the pinnacle of love? A captivating movie with a few rough edges which does not completely win its bet. But you do get a tender insiders view on the loneliness and camaraderie of country life… if you want it.

Czech director Bhodan Slama's acclaimed The Country Teacher looks at love and loss at a rural dairy farm in the Czech Republic. It is a gentle, humorous, and often inspiring film about the struggle for self-acceptance and the resilience of people who must go through many spaces to discover that their lives work better together than apart. The film has gorgeous photography of the rural Czech countryside and includes the birth of a calf, perhaps an allegory for the need for three individuals to pull together. It is a narrative-centered film of considerable depth, one in which there is strong character growth and development, the kind of film Hollywood used to make.

When Petr (Pavel Liska), a gay teacher from Prague, arrives to teach science to youngsters in a small farming town, suspicions are raised by the principal (Cyril Drozda) about what he is running away from. The teacher, however, says everything is OK but his reticence and constant hangdog expression suggests otherwise. Petr manages to form a bond with a single mother, a fiercely independent cow-herder named Maria played by the exceptional Czech actress Zuzana Bydzovska. Distressed over the breakup of an abusive marriage, she looks to Petr to fulfill her needs but discovers in a hayloft that his needs may be quite different than hers.

Another example of unfulfilled longing is the relationship between Maria's lanky 17-year-old son Lada (Ladislav Sedivy) and Beruska (Teresa Boriskova), a girl visiting from the city who plans on studying law. Both seem to be involved with each other until Lada begins to question whether or not he is not smart enough for his more sophisticated girlfriend. Beru shrugs it off until she perhaps comes to the same conclusion and runs off with Petr's visiting ex-boy friend (Marek Daniel), a scatter-brained headhunter from Germany whose major talent seems to be one of disruption.

In one of the film's most revealing scenes, Petr visits his slightly overbearing mother (Zuzana Kronerova), also a teacher, in Prague and comes out to her after being questioned extensively about an ex-girlfriend. Though there is sadness, there is no bitterness or recrimination and his mother's only concern is that he is not alone. Petr is thoughtful and introspective and when he tells his raucous ex-boy friend that he will not engage in sex without love, we believe and trust him. Lada also trusts him as he begins to tutor him not only in Math but in life. Unfortunately, though the heart is strong, the flesh is weak and, after he rescues a drunken Lada from drowning, Petr gives in to his impulses and engages in some harmless but inappropriate touching when Lada is asleep.

Though there are the expected expressions of shock and name-calling, it is plain that the emotional bond that the three have formed outweighs their shock, even though it takes time for them to realize that. Backed by the gorgeous, meditative music of Vladimir Godar's Mater, The Country Teacher ultimately is not about coming out, however, but about coming to terms with one's own humanity. Pavel Liska is strong as the self-doubting, insecure teacher whose emotions range from love and longing to guilt and redemption and each person, in their own way, emerges from their own dark corner to reach a place of peace and self-acceptance.

In spite of some unwanted melodrama, The Country Teacher avoids stereotypes and achieves a searing emotional power by telling us that love is stronger than fear and that there can be no love without forgiveness, a sentiment that some film critics have labeled "implausible". I am reminded, however, of the country priest in Bernanos' novel Diary of a Country Priest, who said, "How easy it is to hate oneself. True grace is in forgetting. Yet, if pride could die in us, the supreme grace would be to love oneself in all simplicity as one would love any one of those who themselves have suffered and loved." The Country Teacher touches those moments of true grace.

Bohdan Sláma wrote and directed this sensitive and tender story about public versus private views of sexuality in the Czech Republic: his gifts as an artist of cinema are formidable. He knows how to tell a story, how to create a fascinating group of characters that with little dialogue speak loudly about human rights and understanding of differences.

THE COOUNTRY TEACHER ('Venkovský ucitel') opens with a young teacher from Prague who has joined the faculty of a small country school - an environment completely at odds with the rush and high life of the city. Petr (Pavel Liska) is a quiet, withdrawn, seemingly depressed young man who immediately connects with the students in his Ntural History class. The students and community accept this new gift to education in the provinces but wonder why such a fine teacher would leave Prague. Petr finds housing in a curtained room of a meager household and begins his quiet cloistered life away from what seems to be a traumatic escape from his home in Prague. We soon learn that in Prague, Petr had problems with a relationship and his fellow teacher mother cannot understand why Petr cannot find happiness as a normal married male. He confesses to her that he is gay and his mother (and elusive father) begin to understand why Petr 'escaped'. Back in his new country home Petr makes friends with a single mother Marie (Zuzana Bydzovská) who serves as both mother and father to her 17 year old son Lada (Ladislav Sedivý), a funky lad in love with a girlfriend whom he sees as his intellectual superior. Marie hopes to attract Petr but when overtures are ignored she instead engages Petr to tutor Lada. All goes well until Petr's ex partner (Marek Daniel) visits and disrupts the environment of Petr's closeted safe life. As Petr and Lada grow in their relationship as tutor and pupil, Lada discovers he can indeed succeed academically. After a night wen the two drink too much an incident occurs that unveils Pter's growing love for Lada and Lada leaves in disgust. The world explodes for Petr but gradually his honesty as presented first to Marie and then to his faculty begins a course of healing that leads to a touching closure of the story.

The cast is first rate and capably convey the spectrum of emotions that surround this little tale of discovery. How Bohdan Sláma is able to keep his story aligned in transferring between Prague and the little county province demonstrates a sensitivity to human interaction that is equal to the finest writers and directors. In Czech with English subtitles.

Grady Harp

In the film one can find some very good acting, especially by the main actors.

All the rest is a bit sad. The plot makes little sense. Obviously written and filmed by people who have no idea what life in the country is like. (And loved by cinema goers who have no idea what country life is like.) At too many points you just wonder, "why is this happening?" but never get an answer. The psychology of the characters is rather weak. On the whole you are left with the feeling that things are somehow random... The music does not fit. Etc. Certainly not a film I'd like to see again, and not the best current Czech cinematography can offer.

So I've just seen the movie and am really amazed. Slama has done it again. I am Czech and I must admit that I am very displeased with Czech cinematography of the last decade. Czech producers and directors make the same rubbish over and over again. I focus only on Slama as in my opinion he is the only exception. He proved himself to be the best we have now.

I absolutely loved his previous movie Stesti and I had very high anticipation concerning his new one - Venkovsky ucitel - The Country Teacher. And my expectations were fulfilled.

The movie is in some way similar to the previous one, not only in the choice of actors but also in the structure. The movie is pure drama around one man, but in fact there are three main characters and minor ones. Slama is very good in building the scenes and describing the characters. He introduces the key ones, shows us the surroundings and than he starts to develop the story he wants. He cultivates the characters and plays with the theme of the picture.

I don't want to go into details about the story. Watch for yourself, it 's very strong and very touching.

Throughout the whole movie I was amazed (again) by Slama's very subtle but in a way strong directing. Also the cinematography is perfect. All the actors did a great job and I haven't seen such good performances for a long time (certainly not in Czech movies).

All in all I was very impressed by the story, acting and directing. As far as I am concerned - Slama is still on the top.

If nevertheless should I say something negative I would have probably one thing - in the first half, maybe third, of the movie the editing seemed to me somehow "discontinuous". Like some cuts were a little bit too rash. But it was just my little feeling.

I definitely recommend this movie. Very good and deep drama and top- notch movie making.

This film is hugely flawed in 2 respects.

1. The portrayal of gays here is essentially a cinematic echo of the 1950s message that gay people portrayed in cinema are inwardly tortured, victims, tragic, predatory, paedophile and troublemakers. Also that when the drama of their homosexuality is finally revealed it is the cause of a terrible terrible thing. This film manages to tick every single on of these boxes which is utterly unforgivable considering it was made in 2008.

There is no excuse for this. There are dozens of films portraying gay people currently being released which specifically turn their backs on these well known negative conceits and i accuse the director of falling into the trap of being homophobic and uninformed about his subject or the genre in which he posits his movie. (Gay themed film.)

2. The director also makes the mistake of portraying rural people as essentially unsophisticated and mistrusting of the urban folk. It is silently given that they would be prejudice against the secret being harboured by the school teacher because they are small minded.

However as a gay person who grew up in a very rural village, i would point out that rural people are not so small minded and heterosexually strident as portrayed. Rural people look after their own and protect what is theirs. Consequently you will find in rural communities that many different kinds of strange relationships are totally accepted and understood and that a simple village person is not so clueless about the extraordinary variations of human nature.

The director did not understand the rural condition and so having built up the boy's mother to be a woman of depth and substance he reduced her by causing her reaction to homosexuality to be so disproportionally traumatic. It didn't make sense at all. It's not such a big deal. But it was made a big deal because nobody was really ever good friends with each other in this film. I didn't buy the tears and drama. It was wrong. I think she would have been much more clued up and confrontational and suffice to say she needed to produce any other reaction other than the one she made in order for this movie to break the mold.

This film was made by someone who doesn't quite grasp the nature of the contexts he portrays. It was a missed opportunity to play against the usual clichés and he eventually fell into all the well worn and outmoded narrative traps that cinematic discourse has spent the past 30 years exposing.

Although early on, an attentive viewer can guess at the ending (or a good portion of the ending), the film never loses its power. There are five strong characters in this film, and the relationships between them are wonderfully complex, as only a non-American film can portray. There are no simple answers here; life is complicated, even in a Czech farming village. By the time the film ends, we know exactly what it would be like to live in this place, what we would do for work and fun, who our friends would be, what the future would hold for us. Although much of this view is filtered through the main character, the teacher, his non- judgmental approach allows us to appreciate how things are in a world different from ours. From the outset, the teacher clearly has secrets; this, oddly, does not drive the plot as much as the question of how he will integrate into an environment different from the world of Prague and elite schools that this son of a woman science professor used to inhabit. This film, sans car chases, sans bombs, sans gratuitous anything, is mesmerizing.

I saw this last year in a beautiful theater downtown where one sits in an easy chair and has a beer. I went with two friends. We went reluctantly, more for the chairs and beer than for any high cinematic experience; picking this movie out of a handful that were playing at the time. I think we were really lucky to see it. I wept a few times, with sadness in the middle, with joy towards the end. Very subtly told, beautifully shot. I really loved it. All the roles were well acted. The final scene was magical. One of a dozen movies that have ever moved me in this way. I'm very appreciative to the filmmakers. Thank you. And since I need a few more words for the ten lines.

"Country teacher" was the first Czech movie to be shown in Morocco during the European cinema week 2010 edition. The motion picture left the majority of the audience in a complete unease and resentment due to its depiction of Homosexual themes not fully accepted by the local culture. But what turned me off, was not the subject but the treatment of what seemed a genuine compelling premise.

the first shots introduce us to the protagonist(Petr) getting used to his new life as a teacher of a primary school in a rural region, the cinematography at first captures the lush beautiful landscape in a smooth direct fashion in contrast with the confusion and unease growing inside the title character that obviously hides a terrible secret that prompted him to flee his urban life for a hideout somewhere. But what seemed a build up for a tense deep narration, gets clumsily wasted when a single scene tells us that pets is struggling with his homosexuality and the obtrusive control of his mother that happens to teach in the same high school he left. This revelations seems to the author/director so groundbreaking that he relies for the rest of the motion picture on emotional tear jerker situations and lines never fully explained and lacking a simple coherent narrative line. There was some attempt at graphic and verbal symbolism through some teaching classes about the animal realm and some shots with special attention paid to the background but the whole thing falls short of any valuable addition to the story since forced and not heartily composed.There's also the uneven insertions of the soundtrack composed solely of modern classical vocal solos that pops up out of nowhere and fades unnoticed.

What really appalled me to finish with was the everybody-understands -forgives-themselves and everybody else ending. No denouement of the events led to what seemed a forced finale witch sole purpose was to transform the tortured souls into free forgiving new born persons that collaborate on a last symbol-loaded scene: the birth giving of a calf unwisely inserted into the narration but beautifully shot.

Overall a weak entry of the eastern European author cinema, that needs more coherent narration if it wants to win over a reluctant Moroccan audience uneasy with queer cinema to begin with!

FIRST: Let us FOCUS on the Title's Content and Context....

When viewing this MADE IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC FILM! The phrase CULTURAL CLASH kept popping into my brain! But not in the tradional sense.... Instead... The CLASH between U. S. Viewers and the CULTURE of the characters and situations that appear during its 95 Minutes!

Ahhh! The joys of the simple life!!! ....Yes, which go hand-in-hand with the joys of a simple movie! The COUNTRY TEACHER proved to be both an immensely enjoyable and, indirectly, an oddly educational experience!

Watching movies from MANY different countries is an absolutely enthralling endeavor! Each nation's films tend to exhibit a peculiar cultural signature spin, that is a delightfully intriguing puzzle, waiting to be deciphered and savored. An appetite for Czech films is undoubtedly an acquired taste!

Let me share some of the things that made TEACHER such a cinematic plum. Very In-Your-Face, but without straining in the least to do so! The very first thing that jumps out at the viewer is the physical appearance of the actors themselves. WOW! Talk about the antithesis incarnate of the 2-hours-per-day-at-the- gym-capped-teeth-multiple -plastic-surgery-and- hair-implant-monthly-Botox-injections "LOOK" that seems to be practically the NORM in Hollywood! This cast looks like they were sent from "Real-People 'R' US", just after dropping out of their weekly AA meetings!

Also, there were a couple moments in the film where I began feeling somewhat uncomfortable with the direction the movie began to go in, but before this discomfort escalated into something more serious, the movie veered off instead in a pleasantly unexpected direction!

Absolutely ZERO formulaic Hollywood fluff, here...NO Siree, Bob! Two cultural notes: Boy, these Czechs sure are at ease with nudity! People running around nude in the house.... Hey, doesn't EVEN raise an eyebrow! Also, people are ever so cooperative with official government policy! OK...Now Dee Government say "No more discrimination against gays in Dee workplace!" and its: "DAH! Dee government says vee must do dis, so vee are on Board 100% !"

One pleasant and unexpected surprise...The Tradtion Czech Folk(?) music! Very soothing and haunting melodies. I'll have to ask some of my Czech students to fill me in! Be sure not to miss it! Recommended by Friend-MOVIE Freak 66-Please Read her Review also!

7.75* Rounded up to 8********

ENJOY! / DISFRUTELA!

Our teacher (P. Liska) in question leaves his prestigious job at an equally prestigious school in Prague to assume a far more mundane position in the Czech country-side. He looks lost, bewildered and reticent, speaking only when absolutely necessary. Is he hiding something, fearful of past skeletons in his closet coming to the forefront to haunt him mercilessly?

He settles in with a small farm family consisting of a woman and her son, who have their own fair share of past trials and tribulations unto themselves. An old mate of the "teach" (our title teacher) from the city finds his way out into the country to find our protagonist teacher and sparks immediately fly. Our "teach" has suppressed his homosexual orientation to all in the countryside and yet the mate from Prague, who was the teacher's former lover, is hell-bent on renewing their affair and is very demonstrative about it. "Teach" wants no part in it, as he wants a relationship based on love, not lust.

Without telling too much more of the story line, suffice it to say that the old skeletons to which I earlier referred are brought to the forefront in a very skillfully paced manner by the director B. Slama. Teach's so-called search for love degenerates temporarily into deriving sexual satisfaction from the young son on the farm. The unsolicited advances by "teach" are strongly and virulently rejected by the young boy who now hates the new guest teacher. Now the teacher, the mother and her son have to deal with this new trauma, or closet skeleton, if you will, in addition to all their prior baneful experiences.

Just how all these prior and new experiences will be met and subsequently dealt with and possibly sorted out lies in the hands of our skillful director and cast. What they do and how this is accomplished results in a tender yet forcefully portrayed set of scenes, where each of our protagonists has to deal honestly and openly with their strengths as well as their weaknesses and honestly open up to one another. What you may deduce from the movie's ending is that it is not an ending at all, but in fact a beginning, a Genesis, if you will!!

How often do you get to see two actual cow births in a film? The scenes of farm life in the Czech Republic are a wonderful opportunity to visit another world and escape our own mundane concerns. The entire film is gorgeous to watch and provides terrific escapism in so many ways.

A young man leaves Prague to go teach in the country. The audience wonders why he has made this move. As he settles in to his new living quarters, which is a small bit of a room in an old woman's house, with only a sheet hung up for privacy, we wonder how long anyone could possibly live like this. Then we meet the varied characters of the village, and we are impressed by the respect and kindness the country teacher has for the villagers. He seems to sincerely care for them.

Then an old lover of his comes to visit. He proves to be a highly disruptive force, and things begin to go wrong in the country teacher's life. Will the troubles unleashed by the unwanted ex-lover's visit cause all of the country teacher's good work to unravel? Will the country teacher have the self-control to keep himself out of trouble? Does he really care for the villagers? Will this story have a sad or happy ending? I won't tell you. But few people would predict the ending of this film correctly, which makes it all the more interesting.

The actors in this film are sublime. Especially the 3 main characters. "The Country Teacher" will stay in your thoughts long after you leave the theatre.

Save yourself time and watch "Something like happiness" one more time to enjoy work of director. Story is weak and unreal: Closet gay guy comes to teach in village, abuses young boy and his mom saves him, after he tries to commit suicide on her field where she feeds cows every day? And after puke and glass of water he is OK to break stones. After some difficulties, whatever they were, young boy comes back home and birth of calf in which all three of them assist make them to forgive and they live happily ever-after...widowed mother, guy gay and abused boy. Oh...and we know that it is straightforward movie because we saw a scene with puke-cleaning so it is clear that director does not embellish the truth? Oh, give me a break. The only thing I liked was a music, wonderful one.

The film starts as a school teacher moves from teaching a school in the big city to teaching at a school in a small country village. It doesn't take long before it's clear that he's escaping something - desperately wanting to leave something behind and start over again. When his past catches up with him it becomes clear that there is no escaping it - you are what you are.

Set in a typical everybody knows everybody small village this film plays out pretty smoothly, telling its sad tale at a very steady pace. The actors are doing their jobs flawlessly, playing their roles in a most believable way giving the film a very "real" feeling and it becomes very easy to grow sympathy for the characters - enough to overcome the mistakes they make in their lives.

I guess one message the film is telling us is that the road to happiness is marked with pit holes and bumps and that it leaves you bruised and battered. It's a good message and makes for a solid but somewhat painful film.

8 out of 10 steps on a wobbly road

After seeing many recent movies that have jumbled time sequencings or puzzling plot elements, it is good to see a movie like this that is told in linear time at a pace that allows you to appreciate its qualities.

The story is that of a teacher in the Czech Republic, who decides to leave his post at an exclusive prep school in Prague to take a position teaching natural science in a small rural school. The school is happy to get such a qualified teacher, but also suspicious of why such a person would come to their school. In due course we come to understand the decision.

It is not without significance that the teacher (if he had a name in the movie, I missed it) favors teaching about biological diversity, since he is gay. Initially the teacher hides his sexual orientation out of the usual fears, and one of the interesting facts I got from having seen this is to understand that the status of gays in the Czech Republic is pretty much the same as that in the United States--teetering on the fulcrum of acceptance.

The filming is highly accomplished. I particularly liked the deft usage of the widescreen format. A lot would be lost by seeing a pan and scan version, since there are so many wonderful shots of characters on the sides of the screen played against a meaningful background. Director Sláma has a real talent for positioning his characters. The scene where the teacher reveals his sexual orientation to his mother, and subsequent scenes involving his father, are exquisitely filmed. Initially the teacher and his mother face each other from opposite sides of the screen with the father seen outside tending his bees. Then the father comes in and interposes himself between the two, then the characters change positions with the mother on one side, the teacher in the middle, and the father on the right, and on it goes. That sequence is one of the most carefully thought out and beautifully filmed I have ever seen. The camera work in this film is that of a highly skilled artist.

The characters are finely drawn with strong performances by all and the score adds depth.

This film should appeal to anyone who likes character driven movies where you get to know, care for, and understand the people and their motivations.

Atmospheric and likable and engaging. Non-standard characters and a rural environment strangely reminiscent of my childhood in 1970s West Germany. Are there still houses in the Czech Republic that have no indoor plumbing? The film makes us believe so. A few post- modernist monikers, such as cellphones, computers, and the PET bottle from which the peasant woman drinks her home-made cider cannot prevent the bad guy's convertible from looking just outlandish, like a UFO on wheels.

And yet there is one thing about the plot that worries me. What if the teacher were straight and the student he molested were a female? Would it still be acceptable by the (double) standards of 21st-century political correctness if the victim's mother insisted on her daughter to forgive the molester? I doubt it and imagine a public outcry not only from the feminist side. The gay rapist may be forgiven, the straight one may not. We have come a long way. The Czechs even more so.

I am Czech and I remember this movie running in theatres in Praha when it came out. I didn't go to see it but remembered the title. I had no clue what it was about and now watched it on Netflix. Though it seemed quite stagnant and boring in the first third, then it kicked off with drama this was made about. I remained glued till the end and was very very pleased that it carries a message of acceptance. I can only imagine such people in small towns and villages anywhere ... having it very hard, and it feels so warm to see it end as you'd want it to...i.e. well. I hope it is seen by many people especially who need a mind change. I applaud the makers.