Touchless

Encore une heure après le film, je suis en train de me demander si je l’ai bien compris ou, plus exactement, si je l’ai compris tout court. Au début, une ambiance sulfureuse s’installe avec réalisme, mais ensuite les choses s’accélèrent, changent et je suis largué… largué jusqu’à la fin du métrage ! Normalement, je me serais emporté contre ce film et je l’aurais qualifié de connerie, mais je m’abstiendrai, ne fût-ce que parce que le réalisateur n’a que dix-neuf ans, puis parce qu’il a très bien choisi ses acteurs (en particulier Vítů et Malý qui sont excellents) et que la photographie et la BO fonctionnent à merveille. Ce n’est pas un quatre étoiles pur et dur, mais pour un début, c’est un film vraiment bon. (24/12/2013)

The youngest Czech director, Matěj Chlupáček, is not afraid to pose more questions than he answers in his debut feature-length film. This was a short excerpt from the official text of the distributor. The debut of the youngest Czech director, Matěj Chlupáček, didn't give me any answers, while not raising any questions, either, except for one. Why the hell did I watch this? Throughout the entire time, I couldn't decipher what the youngest Czech director wanted to convey. The story, dialogues, and monologues were all equally pathetic just like all the performances. The film didn't offer me anything, and I will treat it the same way and keep the stars for myself. / Lesson learned: Practicing at home can be useful in your future life. (03/03/2023)

As a short story, this film looked good, but with a film, you have to work with actors, sound, and image, not just words. This is the problem with this story, which is strong in its essence, but lacks something in its execution. Marian Roden doesn't act poorly, but his scenes are sometimes awkward. Tereza Vítů is young, beautiful, and brave, which the film needed. I'm glad she is currently an actress at the South Bohemian Theatre. Unfortunately, there is unnecessarily too much filler in the film "Bez doteku". It would benefit from a significantly shorter running time. It would look more interesting as an experiment in the theater. Unfortunately, the ending feels hollow. (18/04/2014)

Slightly overstating the case, I’d venture to say that this film wanted to look like Sucker Punch directed by Robert Bresson, but it rather looks far more like an average episode of Private Traps with lousy dramaturgy, shallow psychology, very unconvincing dialogue, absolutely unnecessary sex scenes and decent potential for camp (Malý‘s psychopathic asshole). I appreciate the courage it took to make a film that is so unpleasant for viewers, but that unpleasantness should have been derived from the logic of the plot or the narrative form, not just for the pleasure of the filmmakers, whose tremendous pseudo-mysteriousness is a rather feeble defence against possible criticism. 35% (28/02/2013)

I don’t know why but the story reminded me of a crazy Czech film After Sex. The only difference is that the Touchless is more professionally done. However, the sex scene with Ondřej Malý was horrible. Among the rest of the sex scenes it was so off that I felt embarrassed in his place. Fortunately, he saved it by his brilliant acting performance. After all, the rest of the cast was great too. I didn’t care for the story, but the filmmaking wasn’t bad. (25/05/2018)