Lovers in the Year One

I already like a few films from Balík's filmography, and I can easily count Lovers in the Year One among them. In general, I suffer from the lack of period sets when films are set in a specific past (here we have 1945 and 1946, for example), but a few interesting formal ideas for the opening and the framing of Otčenášek's story with documentary footage from the Prague Uprising set the stage for the romance between the fragile Vančurová and the mentally unhinged Preiss to play out in a timeless rather than historical plane. It has an interesting approach, an interesting romance, and the nice idea to combine the love of a partner with the love of cinema. (20.08.2016)