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Armenian spectators will have an opportunity for the first time to watch a cross-section of the Czech and Czechoslovak films from 27 September until 1 October 2018 at Moscow Cinema in Yerevan, the Czech Embassy in Armenia told Panorama.am. 

The Days of Czech and Czechoslovak Cinema are dedicated to the 100th Anniversary of Declaration of Independence of Czechoslovakia. This anniversary has influenced the selection of movies that are not only artistic masterpieces but also testimonies of difficult historical moments, through which Czechoslovakia and later Czechia had to navigate. 

The cinema days will kick off on 27 September by “A Prominent Patient” – biopics of Jan Masaryk, Minister of Foreign Affairs and son of the first Czechoslovak president. The film released in 2016 that has won Czech film prizes in all the main categories depicts three years of Jan Masaryk’s life (1937-1939) against the background of turbulent history. While his disordered personal life raised eyebrows in society, Masaryk in his later life fought fascism and communism, and when he eventually died in 1948, it was and still is uncertain whether he committed suicide under pressure or whether he was murdered by his foes.

The opening film will be followed by a string of movies that have lost nothing of their quality and topicality in spite of their age. “Skeleton on Horseback” from 1937 is set in a fictitious country strongly resembling Nazi Germany, in which the outbreak of an unknown disease leads a doctor who only knows a cure to a dilemma whether to treat everyone equally when powerful Marshall prepares a war. “The Cremator” from 1968 is a film on the verge of black comedy and horror. Set in World War II, a mad cremator believes cremation relieves earthly suffering and sets out to save the world.

“The Ear” from 1970 is set in the fifties, when circumstances lead a high-ranking official and his wife to believe they are under surveillance by their own government. “Cosy Dens” from 1996 is a bitter-sweet comedy taking place in the time of the Prague Spring in 1968. Events and disputes in one family illustrate the tensions between freedom and communist conviction at the fortnight of the Soviet invasion to Czechoslovakia.

The moviegoers are invited by the Czech Embassy to Moscow Cinema free of charge. The opening film will be screened at 7pm while all the others at 6:30pm. All the movies will be preceded by a short documentary about the formation of Czechoslovakia.