Les Petites Marguerites

It’s truly hard not to compare the two Maries in Daisies to Hana and Hana (characters from a comic strip published in the Czech magazine Reflex in the days when I wasn’t ashamed to read it), two other naïve adolescent girls who in overheard phrases guilelessly comment on the strangeness of the world and (inadvertently) their own weirdness. Their monstrous vanity leaves adults indifferent. Criticism is thus not directed only at the ranks of nihilistic youth. Nor are the working people (the man in the garden, the workers leaving the factory) spared, as they are just as indifferent to what’s happening around them as the two Maries are. Here and there, though especially in the opening scene, this film by Chytilová, Kučera and Krumbachová resembles a comic book set in motion and also having a fragmented structure. The repeated attempts to cut them out and paste them on the wall corresponds to the “paperiness” of the protagonists. An interesting way to ensure that one leaves something behind. Like the pages of a comic book, the flat shots lead us not deeply into the picture, but to the surface, and the people whom the director is primarily criticising with her film are also superficial. At the same time, the excess of formalistic devices used in the film is not a means of gratuitously testing how much the viewer can bear (which was the impression I got from Fruit of Paradise). The abrupt change of colour filters corresponds to the absent-mindedness of the girls, who have a short attention span (their mantra could be “I’m bored already”). The film’s dramaturgy stands out with the same impudence as the visual aspect. Instead of a linearly constructed drama, we watch a discontinuous sequence of episodes. A similar structure characterised the anarchic slapstick of the silent film era, to which some of the Maries’ gestures directly refer. Whereas in those early slapstick movies a man was usually the one who brought ruin, in Daisies the men are those who get ruined, whether directly (the cheating of adulterers), symbolically (the cutting of phallic objects) or symptomatically (rebellion against the rules as rebellion against the patriarchy). The protagonists’ consideration of why they exist, how they exist and whether they are bothered by not existing differently (“it doesn’t matter!”) is brushed off as being irrelevant by the sincere final dedication, from which flows amusingly stubborn, youthful anger at the world of the old geezers who think they hold all of the power. Without orgies with apocalyptic reach, without absolute negation, this provocative, visually captivating exaggeration of their/our individual transgressions would not be complete. 80% (08/07/2012)

Ahh, the golden 60s, when the ideological barriers and censorship fell, but at the same time generous state support remained, so creators could experiment and mock or make fun of society and the government. It's no wonder that many filmmakers miss those times. The truth is that a number of films from that era wouldn't have been made in so-called normal times. Daisies is an experimental plaything that is far from ordinary film productions and the average moviegoer. The film is valuable for film theorists and dedicated cinephiles in terms of film language, visual composition, editing, and camerawork. On the other hand, it lacks a lot of things that the average moviegoer expects, and the current high rating on FilmBooster is due to snobbery and imitation with a high number of reviews. Overall impression: 40%. (01/02/2009)

Not recommended for epileptics, pregnant women, children, or anyone else. Chytilová, Juráček and Krumbachová? Absolutely not. However, I am moved by the colors, because as I'm used to seeing the horrors of the 1960s mostly in B&W, this is another shocker. (06/12/2012)

A very provocative mix of the Soviet montage school (the inspiration is already evident in the opening credits, when we watch the operation of a certain machine), comic-book narrative and the extravagant aesthetic vision of our most acclaimed director. It takes a while to get used to the disparate episodic plot, the narrative experiments or the theatrical acting of the lead couple, but the cleverly satirical "anti-regime" undertone soon draws you in and leaves you no choice but to stare helplessly at how so much allegory and unconventionality can end up being entertaining and inspiring. Of course, such peculiarity will impress everyone differently, I belong to those with a greater degree of fascination. 80% (03/05/2016)

"I can't even do that." "So what can we do?" "We can't do anything." Chytilová has always been ahead of other New Wave representatives with her causticity, because her critique of society is first and foremost a critique of patriarchy. And from that perspective, Daisies is easily applicable to the present. Two women who have been declared incompetent, their offence that they continually subvert their assigned roles, and in doing so make poor men cry. After all, most of the film takes place not in the typical socreal setting, but in luxury restaurants and at feast tables with semi-cretinous bourgeoisie, obviously a reference to her long experience in various lower filmmaking positions she held for many years at Barrandov, which seems to have shaped her quite a bit as a person. (30/08/2022)

From a formal perspective, it is an incredibly interesting movie, where it is possible to see how one can play with images, colors, the connection between image and sound. However, from a content perspective, it is already somewhere else slightly. Those two girls are incredibly unpleasant, and I think intentionally so, making it incredibly difficult to enjoy this movie. That is also probably a trademark of an interesting film, but this particular execution did not resonate with me. (18/12/2014)