Directed by Věra Chytilová • 1966 • Czechoslovakia
Starring Ivana Karbanová, Jitka Cerhová, Marie Češková
If the entire world is bad, why shouldn’t we be? Adopting this insolent attitude as their guiding philosophy, a pair of hedonistic young women (Ivana Karbanová and Jitka Cerhová), both named Marie, embark on a gleefully debauched odyssey of gluttony, giddy destruction, and antipatriarchal resistance, in which nothing is safe from their nihilistic pursuit of pleasure. But what happens when the fun is over? Matching her anarchic message with an equally radical aesthetic, director Věra Chytilová, with the close collaboration of cinematographer Jaroslav Kučera, unleashes an optical storm of fluctuating film stocks, kaleidoscopic montages, cartoonish stop-motion cutouts, and surreal costumes designed by Ester Krumbachová, who also cowrote the script. The result is DAISIES, the most defiant provocation of the Czechoslovak New Wave, an exuberant call to rebellion aimed squarely at those who uphold authoritarian oppression in any form.
Up Next in Czechoslovak New Wave
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Closely Watched Trains
Directed by Jiří Menzel • 1966 • Czechoslovakia
Starring Václav Neckář, Josef Somr, Vlastimil BrodskýAt a village railway station in occupied Czechoslovakia, a bumbling dispatcher’s apprentice longs to liberate himself from his virginity. Oblivious to the war and the resistance that surrounds h...
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Pearls of the Deep
Directed by Jiří Menzel, Věra Chytilová, Jaromil Jireš, Jan Němec, and Evald Schorm • 1966 • Czechoslovakia
A manifesto of sorts for the Czech New Wave, this five-part anthology shows off the breadth of expression offered by the movement's versatile directors.
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A Report on the Party and Guests
Directed by Jan Němec • 1966 • Czechoslovakia
In Jan Němec's surreal fable, a picnic is rudely transformed into a lesson in political hierarchy when a handful of mysterious authority figures show up. This allegory about oppression and conformity was banned in its home country but became an inter...
