Karol Spišák

Bloodlines

Based on one of the most famous mysterious disappearances in the world, Richard John Bingham, the Seventh Earl of Lucan, was accused of the murder of 29-year-old nanny Sandra Rivett on 7 November 1974, at his family home at 46 Lower Belgrave Street, in London. Three days later, police found his borrowed Ford Corsair abandoned some 16 miles away near the docks of Newhaven. Since then there have been many reported 'sightings' of Lord Lucan around the globe viz. Africa, Australia, the Netherlands, Ireland and Sicily.

Visions of Europe

Twenty-five films from twenty-five European countries by twenty-five European directors.

Sweet Troubles

A comedy about Simon, an honest, clever confectioner. In practical life, the humble bachelor becomes an easy prey to his boss, his mother, and hordes of women eager to get married. The story incorporates well-tested methods of nearly all major periods in the history of film comedy: from a lumierish etude with the garden hose to a melancholic tramp to the menace of the streets Jacques Tati. Director Juraj Herz made a major contribution to the modest tradition of Slovak film comedy.

She Kept Asking for the Moon

Johanka had a fling with a well digger she had not met before and who, she was most likely certain, would never be around again. Just before his departure, they have sex and she eventually becomes single mother of a baby girl. Now, 18 years later, her daughter Paulina commutes by bus to work in the nearby city, which gives the village gossips the occasional opportunity to remind her of her unknown father. A resultant conflict with her mother makes Paulina take up residence in the city. Johanka, prodded by her also-single friend Jozefka who maintains that a woman without a man is nothing, begins to woo the new teacher Jarek only to discover later that he is married. Paulina, in the meantime, loses her virginity to the soldier Jirka who promptly makes himself scarce. Johanka fails to consider that she actually has a better life than some of her married neighbors, begins to see.

The Assistant

A story of a family that after WWII moved to the south of Slovakia and acquired a prosperous butcher business left behind by a Hungarian emigrant. From the previous owner, the family also inherited a self-assured, greedy assistant who does not like to observe any firm moral principles. He assists the family in gaining wealth but in the long run, he causes the family's moral dissolution. In his most successful feature film, director Zoro Záhon combined a complex drama with excellent acting performances, especially that of Hungarian actor Gábor Koncz in the lead role.

The Ballad of Seven Hanged Men

Seven people waiting for their death. A group of assasins - three men and two women - and Gypsy thief spend their time in prison to be tucked up.

Before Tonight Is Over

Two female clerks using up their savings to enjoy a few days of carefree life, two plumbers looking for an erotic adventure, a building contractor determined to drink away all wages of his workers and a former major who became an alcoholic due to political persecution — these people meet in a ski resort bar somewhere in the High Tatras. During one night they gradually reveal their unfulfilled dreams, illusions and disappointments of ”average" people of those times.

The Sheriff Behind Bars

A dramatic story from the setting of a youth de tention center. Youngster Jakub, out of delusory solidarity, gets convicted of theft and goes to prison in place ofthe "sheriff" of his gang. He naively hopes that the sheriff will appreciate his gesture and leaves the stolen goods in a safe hideaway to later divide them fairly among the gang members. This conviction gives Jakub the strength to endure the unbearable conditions in the center. But reality is often much harsher than naive ideals and hollow relations in the gang.

Every Week Seven Days

The film could have been a lyrical evocation of the ČSSR's first generation: the youngsters born during the war, who grew up in a state violently at pains to find and define itself, and were now ready to break away from the nation-builder ethics of their elders – but Grečner turned it into an anxiety-riddled existentialist vision of a whole globe in fear.