Past

This fairy tale, based on an old French legend, takes place in the Middle Ages at the court of King Pepin. The king wants to marry and, on the advice of Duke Akilon, decides to court the Hungarian princess Bertha. Although the princess has a physical flaw—her feet are too large—Pepin does not care much about that. He remembers how he was friends with Bertha as a little boy and even then admired her bravery. Duke Akilon therefore sets off for Hungary to ask for Princess Bertha's hand in marriage for his king. However, he has his own plan and has no idea what will thwart it.

An exciting drama from a detective history. In 1899 a dead girl - seamstress Anežka Hrůzová - was found between the village of Věžnička and the town of Polná. She was 19 and she had a cutting wound on the throat. There was no sexual violence involved and since the local doctors thought that there was not enough blood on the crime scene, everyone jumped to the conclusion that Jews must have killed her and added her blood to their passover matzot. There was a potential murderer at hand too - a cheeky, not very bright young Jewish rover, Leopold Hilsner…

Lovers & Murderers is about the ongoing war between those who have and those who want to have what the others have. The have-nots see themselves as poor victims trying to get for themselves what is justly theirs. But when the have-nots become haves, they continue to see themselves as victims of the hordes baying for what is justly theirs, and they have neither the energy nor the security to enjoy what they have obtained. The movie takes place in the microcosm of a small apartment building. The principal goal of the young people who share rooms in the building is to move into their own room and, some day, a real apartment. They scheme to get what they're after: form short-lived alliances, petition, frighten, marry, become pregnant, anything that might work. Lovers & Murderers presents Páral's vision of mankind caught in a cyclical process in which ideology pales before the pettiness, cruelty, and self-justification of human nature.

The search for a perverted serial killer opens the door to a dark past. Where do the clues from the rapist's strange handwriting lead?

The body of an art history student who earned extra money selling pet food was found in an elegant residential neighborhood. The search for the killer leads Inspector Bergman and his colleague Sylvia among art lovers. At the center of events is journalist Julie Keller, who has withdrawn to her slightly dilapidated villa...

The beautiful lady, as the locals call the widow and owner of the apartment building, the aging Mrs. Růžena, lives in a neighborhood nicknamed Little Asia. Her last tenant has just moved out, and she lives alone with her parrot. At this moment, an older man, Kurd Kemal, a construction foreman looking for a sublet, comes to the house. After some initial reserve, Růžena and the man understand each other in a special way. Both have their dignity, stemming from living in a different culture, and both have their favorite animal—she has a parrot, he has a black cat. When the distinguished lady learns that Kemal needs to marry a Czech woman so that he does not have to return to his homeland, she tries to help him and marries him...

Jiří Suchý recalls two of the most prominent artistic and creative figures in Czechoslovak culture of the last century: Jiří Voskovec and Jan Werich.