A naive village girl, Valentýna, arrives in Prague and, under dramatic circumstances, becomes reluctantly entangled in the Karlín underworld as a novice prostitute controlled by the slimy gangster Pavouk and his bumbling henchman Milan. She repeatedly refuses the genuine support offered by the incorruptible mounted policeman Viktor Sokol, even as two eccentric observers serve as a choric commentary on the absurdities around them. Through parodic and poetic scenes, ranging from western-inspired mounted police sequences to a surreal “war” over exporting plastic gnomes, the film satirizes contemporary Czech society.
Direction
Tyc's western-parody police sequences are gloriously unhinged.
Production
The plastic gnome war set piece — actual prop comedy genius.
Writing
Choric observers narrating like Greek tragedy crashed a mob movie.
Director
Zdeněk Tyc
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Released during Czech cinema's post-communist identity crisis, UŽ deliberately scrambles genre signals — western, noir, farce — to mirror a nation negotiating new capitalist realities.
Barbora Hrzánová reportedly based Valentýna's physicality on silent film heroines, explaining her deliberate flat affect against the chaos.
CZ
