Jan Žižka

Un fort potentiel d'acteurs de l'ensemble de la troupe. Ben Foster dans la peau de Jan Žižka est parfait, chaque regard ou parole a de l'esprit et du charisme. Les émotions fonctionnent aussi et l'histoire est simple mais suffisamment dramatique et pleine d'action. La dureté et le taux élevé de testostérone surprendront. La bande originale instrumentale de qualité fait plaisir. Ce qui fait chuter le film dans la moyenne est la réalisation, qui rappelle dans certaines scènes un mauvais téléfilm. Par exemple, dans la scène de l'enlèvement de la fiancée, on voit une impuissance totale dans la clarté, le montage, ce qui se passe et comment. Et il y a d'autres moments similaires dans le film. Je suis fan de Petr Jákl pour son audace, son ambition et le fait de réaliser ses rêves de garçon, mais il doit lui-même voir qu'en restant dans la production et en faisant confiance à quelqu'un comme Ron Howard, cela aurait apporté un résultat différent. (09/10/2022)

Jakl really needed the help of renowned historians for this action-packed tale of running around in the woods? Well, fuck me Žižka! It looks as dull as the American The Pagan Queen did 14 years ago. There are basically only four alternating locations: a forest, the chapel with Sigismund, a cave and the quarry of Great America, and the one (!!!) nice visual effect shot in the whole film (the arrival of Boreš in medieval Prague) doesn't save the overall cheapness of it all. I used to think that Jakl is at least a skilled producer who can generate bags of gold, but I'm starting to doubt that too. Ironically, I'll add that his highlight so far is the blood-curdling screaming in Pterodactyl, where at least he was fun. PS: Fuk can't be taken seriously anymore, he's getting more and more ridiculous. (06/11/2022)

The fact that Jan Žižka doesn't come across as unintentionally funny at any point, as I was a little afraid it would, can be considered a small victory. Production-wise, the film is solid, but it fundamentally fails in its narrative. I just couldn't get into the story. It's opaque both at the level of the dramatic arc of political scheming and at the level of individual scenes, where it would help to understand the who and the where, but we can’t. What works well, though, are the brutality sequences. It could have been a solid 80-minute dirty medieval carnage, but when there were ambitions for a bigger Hollywood movie, alas. By the way, I don't really understand why someone makes a film called Jan Žižka and choose a period in Žižka's life that nobody knows anything about, so the plot is completely fabricated. I'm not criticizing it in the sense that I'm projecting it into my rating, I just don't get it. (17/10/2022)

When I came out of the cinema, I was so resigned. I wanted for Jan Žižka to be a good film, and I wished it for myself. But two days passed and the situation changed a bit. Well, enough. I don't really know what to praise about Petr Jákl's latest film, but I also can't say I suffered with it. Overall, it's "just" not very good. Honestly, the twenty-three million dollar budget doesn't show in the result, but that's the least of the problems. The bigger problem is the awfully cluttered fight scenes, but the worst by far is the actual presentation of the story. Sod historical accuracy, whether the armor is period appropriate, that sort of thing. Of course, the fact that Žižka is a woefully flat character with no working motivation and Ben Foster spends most of the time floundering is already a problem. As is the entire second half, which consists more or less of running around the woods, swapping prisoners and looking for someone who just hid somewhere. I can only praise Roland Møller's villain, but the rest is mediocre at best, lacking directorial ideas, an interesting story and anything else that would be worth paying attention to. A Czech big movie of Hollywood standards this is certainly not. (07/09/2022)

History from a quarry pit. I regularly see better action in the promo videos of my competent fencing buddies. Foster is fine, but the character is so medievally random that I don’t know why I would identify with it at all. (14/01/2023)

Petr Jákl practically confessed his love for BraveHeart in every interview. And that's exactly the kind of film he made, an origin story of Žižka for foreign audiences. From the whole cultural phenomenon, he chose the myth of birth and supported it with great names. Among many foreign actors that Jákl managed to work with, I would especially highlight Til Schweiger, who is exactly the star that has enough appeal to the audience and at the same time is not at all foreign to our cultural environment. That's why his Rožmberk is a feast for the eyes and at the same time the most interesting supporting character. As a whole, the film works, has a lot to offer, it's just simply not a remake of Vávra (or an adaptation of Čornej) and local circles are slightly shocked by that. (20/11/2022)

Forget the clichéd portrayal of the Middle Ages and the historical inaccuracies that abound also in Braveheart, Robin Hood, Kingdom of Heaven and the like, I have another problem: what is Jan Žižka really about? What’s its idea? I got lost in the intrigue of "who, with whom and why", I was bored by the second third of the film, which dragged on enormously without much happening in it, and I wasn't very interested in Žižka's emergence, because there was hardly any of it. Žižka was almost always the same Žižka from the beginning to the end, the routine script didn't provide any big surprises. However, what Petr Jákl the (co)screenwriter failed to do, Petr Jákl the director masked quite skillfully, but also in no revelatory way (the battles, or rather skirmishes, are desperately muddled and sometimes look ridiculous, but for example the scene with the lion is really great), and above all Petr Jákl the producer, who managed to get really, really, really good actors, led by a fine Ben Foster and including Michael Caine, who I never thought I would see in a Czech film, let alone Jan Žižka. In spite of all the criticisms, I have to wish the film success, because it is a revelation in domestic filmmaking in a good sense (I don't want to write like a one-eyed man among the blind), and I would like it to show that Czechs can produce something other than romantic comedies and communist dramas. However, if anyone in our country has managed to make a great film of world quality in recent years, it was Václav Marhoul (and he actually made two). (09/09/2022)

Après des années de promesses et de massage médiatique, le voici enfin ! Et quelques minutes après le visionnage, tout le monde est prêt à l’oublier. J’imagine que personne ne s’attendait au film du siècle, mais pour ma part, je m’attendais à une bonne dose de fun. Au final, tout ce que j’ai obtenu, c’est un film d’amateurs gris et assommant, saturé de pathos morne et de visages constipés. À part la chasse incessante au MacGuffin, à savoir l’héroïne principale, et une ébauche bâclée de trio central de souverains où on se demande qui veut comploter contre qui, le scénario n'offre rien d'autre qu'un ramassis des clichés filmiques les plus éculés que l'on puisse imaginer. Nulle trace de caractérisation ou de développement chez les personnages, on cherche en vain les dialogues et échanges intéressants, la narration n’est claire à aucun moment, de dramaturgie il n’est jamais question et côté cadence, on repassera. Jan Žižka (Medieval) offre ce que la production tchèque a de plus terne à offrir pour le budget le plus élevé à ce jour. (08/09/2022)

Petr Jákl's Jan Žižka is (and will be) one of those films that divides audiences into several (Hussite?) camps in terms of their reception. I went to the cinema with lukewarm expectations, as there were several factors that didn't exactly play into the film's hands – in short: a cast of international stars in the most expensive Czech film about our most famous warlord, and the whole thing is helmed by a former judoka and stuntman. But I was pleasantly surprised by the result. Yes, you have to turn a blind historical eye, even if Jákl "cheated" by focusing on an unknown phase of Žižka's life, but it is still a solidly made historical co-production that can stand comparison with (purely) foreign films of the same genre. From a technical point of view, it is a decently crafted piece of filmmaking with more than one raw moment, and the film visually benefits from beautiful Czech locations and castles. In terms of screenwriting, it's broadly in keeping with the genre, so you shouldn't expect any deep dialogue or breathtaking plot twists. I was quite pleased with the cast. Ben Foster took up the mace with honour and the fictional character of Lord Boris (though the title is not accurate) played by Michael Caine also impressed me. Perhaps it was my momentary state of mind in the cinema, and quite definitely it was the fact that I come from Přibyslav, the place where Jan Žižka died, but Jakl's tribute to heroism just suited me. Three and three-quarters stars! PS: I never expected to see a lion in a Czech historical film. But on the other hand - why not? (14/09/2022)

Énorme déception. Je peux imaginer l'immense travail qu’il a fallu fournir pour réaliser ce film. Mais pourquoi et pour qui ? Les Américains et probablement tous les autres étrangers à part les Slovaques ne comprendront rien du contexte, surtout à cause de la façon dont Venceslas et surtout Sigismond sont représentés et de l'espace qu'ils occupent dans le film. Les Tchèques passionnés d'histoire doivent avoir l'impression, comme moi, de regarder un film intitulé « La bataille pour la princesse française », car ce n'est pas Žižka, mais cette princesse qui joue le rôle principal. On court dans la forêt sans but, on livre quelques batailles correctes, mais sinon, le scénario est catastrophique. L'intrigue est une vraie mer… En plus, d’un point de vue subjectif, j'ai trouvé les acteurs tchèques tragicomiques, à l'exception de Karel Roden. Je fais de mon mieux, mais je ne parviens pas à trouver beaucoup de points positifs – je ne suis pas surpris que Jan Žižka n'ait visiblement pas eu et n'aura pas de succès à l'étranger. Il y a des milliers, voire des dizaines de milliers d'histoires comme celle-ci ; au niveau de la Tchéquie, c'est un divertissement coûteux, mais ailleurs, c’est dans la norme. Dommage, je me réjouissais et croisais les doigts pour que le film réussisse. Et ce ne sont pas les stars internationales qui sauvent la mise. (09/01/2023)

I understand that shooting a big-budget film about the Hussite Wars would be extremely expensive (almost insanely so). Still, I consider it a cop-out that Petr Jákl placed Yan Sheeshka, Sigismund "The Red Fox," and Henry Rosenberg in a period from which we know nothing about Žižka. Instead of a historical film based on Jan Žižka's true story, it is a pure fabrication, which couldn't go wrong because there is no solid foundation. Anyway, the original title of this film is Medieval, and in this regard, Petr Jákl succeeded. Although historical fencing experts may disagree, I liked the action scenes. What I consider a mistake is that the film was heavily promoted under the title Jan Žižka. With the original title and without historical characters, it could have been an average medieval action flick. To sum it up, the action scenes were the only thing I liked about this film about the beginnings of a future military leader and promoter of jigsaw puzzles made of hay wagons. The story fell flat on me and didn't stir any emotions. Despite the creators' undeniable effort, it left me somewhat indifferent. / Lesson learned: If you plan to shoot a historical or "historical" film, find out the difference between a bow and a crossbow. (28/01/2023)

I was looking forward to the epic Medieval. The trailer promised a dark story with hints of romance. Honestly, you can see that the movie had a big budget and high-quality set design. The actors are easy to watch and do a good job. But that's where the positives end; the rest is pretty worthless. The plot is empty and flat and the script is downright stupid. The characters behave confusedly and nonsensically, while the soundtrack is exaggerated and overly dramatic, absolutely forcing the viewer to experience the movie dramatically. Medieval had the potential to be a dark historical story of European stature, but Jákl served us Hollywood junk, which is over-sweetened, and its stupidity and cheap plot culminate in an unwanted happy ending. (09/09/2022)