Saving One Who Was Dead

I was pleased to see that the unorthodox formatting of the images was not just a random "conceptual" decision, and rather suited the narrative’s setting and plot very well. Plus, it was actually refreshing to see the work in an atypical context. However, I still had a fundamental problem with this movie because on the one hand Saving One Who Was Dead's message tries to portray the naked humanity and unadulterated reality of death, and on the other hand does so through characters who act and speak like robots and aliens taking delight in symbols and metaphors rather than behaving like human beings. So, in the end, the movie is completely devoid of humanity and does not generate much empathy from the audience. I did not understand this creative decision at all, and the movie seemed to want to be this kind of slightly weird and deeply profound conceptual work about life, death, and everything in between, and yet in the finale it came off more like the repetitive pretentious posturing of Little Crusader, although that was a lot more unbearable. I have to also mention that I found the choice of casting Vojta Dyk and Zuzana Maurery for the main roles was very disconcerting because they did not really look like mother and son (you cannot tell there is a sixteen year age gap by the way they look), and until it was explicitly stated in the movie, I thought they were siblings. Then, for the next half hour, instead of thinking about what the movie was trying to convey, all I was contemplating were the strange casting decisions. In addition, the scenes of a deadpan, stiff-necked Dyk staring down the labyrinth of hospital corridors were so bad they were actually funny. [KVIFF 2021] (29.08.2021)

A sometimes almost comical play on art. The idiotically soulful expression of Dyk walking down the corridors of the hospital in the style of 90s adventure movie animation. Characters who speak like they're from a Czech language audio book. Repetitive static boring half-measures and a new age aura revealing a simple lack of inspiration. When Kadrnka focuses on the hospital corridors, their detached mummery and the assorted patients scattered throughout, you can see what motivated the film. But it's so overwrought and spasmodic that it instead makes me wonder if Kadrnka's irritating slowness and heavy themes confused a lot of people, like it’s supposed to be substantial filmmaking, yet the episode where the protagonist meets his child self in a dream sequence, for example, passes him the ball, and it ends up in his father’s hands, who finally opens his eyes, looks like a straight-up intentional parody of an art film. (28.02.2022)