J'aime, tu aimes

An excellent distinctive insight into normalization hopelessness and wasteland, supported by the "new wave" empathy and authenticity of the characters. Its great choice of types ranks this film among the best works of the 80's, and the script is raw and very open, focusing more on drawing the situation out than on comprehensive storytelling... From my point of view, it works very similarly to Sláma's Something Like Happiness- it builds the supporting motif from seemingly incoherent and scattered lines, in the end letting it fully resonate in all of its imperfection and fragility. Pišta's search for love in the gray world of boredom, emptiness and masks may not be very attractive from the viewer's point of view; however if you play Hanák's game and perceive his world as a telling slice of normalization reality, then I love, You Love hides much more than just the story of one individual... This is basically the unhappy crystallization of the whole of Czechoslovak society. (09/06/2008)

Of Hanák's five feature films, I Love, You Love stands out somewhat. Gone is the New Wave of 322, just as the semi-documentary approach of Rose Tinted Dreams is passé. And the purely feminine theme of Simple Pleasures and Private Lives was yet to come. Only interest in man remained. (12/11/2021)