NinadeL

A film that started the series of many TV and film reconstructions that we see today. These events intertwine with each other, and individual stories transition from one film to another along with their actors. It is a pioneering work reconstructing the memories of Zdeněk Mlynář. It's pointless to look for factual errors and assess the selection of actors, as similar details could have been addressed by the creators of other reconstructions.

A film transcript of the play with the same name. Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean premiered in 1976 and brought back nostalgia for the 50s; 20 years later, the James Dean fan club reunites and constantly discusses references to his films and memorabilia. It is an interesting perspective on women's film, in which the heroines are still defined by a film star who has been dead for 20 years. Films like Giant have truly been idolized even among professional cinephiles, so it's no wonder that the former group of fans still lives through the original experience. Cher launched her famous solo acting career here, and Sandy Dennis, Sudie Bond (who reunited with Cher in Silkwood), and the still charming Kathy Bates were also excellent.

The Slovakia-Hungary snowy travel guide has been replaced by the summer Croatia travel guide. This lovely kitsch made up of pictures as if from a catalog doesn't even deserve a review, but the main quartet is an absolute eye-candy delight. Pauhofová-Lišková-Marcinková-Norisová, together in their summer dresses, are so beautiful that they should forget about making a movie and instead send out a large-format calendar to the world. ;)

Moonstruck is essentially a perfect romantic comedy, complete with all the stereotypes of the 80s. Unbelievable dialogue, great performances, and a beautiful atmosphere. Everything is connected by Puccini's "La bohème," and it doesn't matter that the mother of the Italian immigrant family is played by Greek actress Olympia Dukakis, or that Nicolas Cage found himself in the era of admiration for acting according to the Actors Studio. Together, it creates such a great and compact whole that can only be admired. I especially enjoyed Cher.

In its time, this was a very important film. Today, the context is missing and the late New Hollywood style is also not universal, but similar trips to the past are still worth attention. Karen Gay Silkwood (1946-1974) became notorious as a union activist dealing with safety at a plutonium-processing nuclear factory. The circumstances of her death raised many questions. Her story became a certain manifesto, although the legal dispute between the factory and the survivors was eventually settled out of court. The factory ceased its operations as early as 1975. The Silkwood case also inspired the film The China Syndrome. From an acting perspective, it is truly an experience, Meryl Streep's remarkable performance in the post-Sophie's Choice era is already an absolute classic today. Cher also gained a great deal of attention for her lesbian character Dolly Pelliker, but the strongest emotions were conveyed by Sudie Bond.

The late work by Ben Travers, "The Bed Before Yesterday" (1975), is truly a delightful late collection by an author who, at the end of his life, reflects on questions of sex with very high quality. The story is set in the time of Traverse's youth, but the author is already informed by life and the post-war sexual revolution. He deliciously observes the awakening of a mature woman who has denied herself sex her whole life due to several childhood and youth mistakes. Victorian morality and a rape on her wedding night convinced Alma that sex is wrong. A second chance did not come with her second marriage, but the third marriage brought Viktor. Hana Maciuchová and Milan Lasica have been a great pair several times, and here they are wonderful too. The circumstances of Alma's awakening are complicated, with several characters from the demi-world and a sophisticated actor teaching Alma French kisses... but one thing is certain, this production is an experience, and it is, of course, a shame that it had a minimal number of performances.

The modern Berlin operetta "Ball im Savoy" by Hungarian composer Paul Abraham premiered on December 23, 1932, literally at the last moment, as Abraham, being Jewish, emigrated in 1933. Therefore, today the operetta is performed with a considerable dose of piety. The play is charming, playful, tender, and entertaining. My favorite hit is, of course, "Känguruh": So, what about the film version? It was produced in an Austrian-Hungarian co-production and offered an opportunity for the entire exile diaspora, led by Gustav Fröhlich's Jewish wife Gitta Alpar. The choreography easily outshines the big shows of Busby Berkeley. The studios were filmed at Hunnia Film Studios in Budapest. The English-language version was created the following year as With Pleasure, Madame.

Formally, it is an interesting conversational film, but unfortunately, the work with the main topic is written very amateurishly. Instead of a real study of situations that the world of open relationships, swingers, and associated emotions may offer, there are a lot of clichés, whether in the view of introducing the issue by one sexually aggressive couple (of course, the alpha male is played by Martin Hofmann), through the presentation of an apparently polyamorous polycule (headed, of course, by Hynek Čermák...) to the typically simplified reactions to the given situations. Hana Vagnerová plays Hana, who dares to discover her sexuality with mutual agreement, her partner is Petr played by Matyáš Řezníček, who does the same until the moment when his partner confesses that she experienced something new with another man. The vain Petr cannot handle this, but at the same time allows Hana to continue with her experiments. While Hana still invites Petr on further adventures, Petr grows disgusted by Hana and finds a new closed relationship. It couldn't be more cliché. The film's promotion almost promised full-length porn, but Tomasz Wiński only made a typical chauvinistic anecdote.

Certainly, of course, even Xena needed an adaptation of Charles Dickens and offered up his "A Christmas Carol" as A Solstice Carol. In the second season, the concept of solitary episodes still prevailed, so it was not a problem to introduce occasional horror episodes (replacing vampires with maenads), a parody of Indiana Jones, a parody of the Miss Universe pageant, something classic from biblical times (the story of David and Goliath from the 1st Book of Samuel), or conversely, classical antiquity (Homer's Odyssey). And so, a Christmas episode set during Mary and Joseph's journey to Bethlehem also had to be included. Xena and Gabby are classically in a good mood, planning gifts, and doing good deeds... There is also a reference to Hercules: The Legendary Journeys in the form of an action figure. The wooden sheep that Gabrielle receives from Xena plays a certain role in the episodes Gabrielle's Hope and Maternal Instincts. The parallel Christmas episode from the series Hercules is A Star to Guide Them.

An Afro-American disco version The Wizard of Oz. It may seem somewhat daring, but considering the enormous phenomenon that the original 14 novels by L. Frank Baum and other subsequent works and adaptations have been since 1900, it's totally fine. Baum's world set a precedent for American children's literature, the main series was published until 1920, and even during the author's lifetime, the first Broadway musicals, film adaptations, radio plays, comics, and short story books were created... After his death, Ruth Plumly Thompson wrote another 21 novels about the Land of Oz. Similar success awaited Dr. Seuss or E. B. White after World War II, but even their now-classic children's books did not surpass the magnitude of The Wizard of Oz. This is how one can view the modern The Wiz as an integral part of a successful series of adaptations that simply respond to the needs of the time and change with it. Schumacher's script is daring, Lumet's direction is creative, and Scarecrow became Michael Jackson's best role in his entire career.