The film begins in 1988 as the Soviet bloc is beginning to disintegrate. František Louka, a middle-aged Czech man dedicated to bachelorhood and the pursuit of women, is a concert cellist struggling to eke out a living by playing funerals at the Prague crematorium. He has lost his previous job at the Czech Philharmonic, having been half-accidentally blacklisted as "politically unreliable" by the authorities. A friend offers him a chance to earn a great deal of money through a sham marriage to a Russian woman to enable her to stay in Czechoslovakia. The woman then uses her new citizenship to emigrate to West Germany, where her boyfriend lives.
The film opens in 1939 Czechoslovakia. Horst, a Czech-German Nazi collaborator married to a German woman and co-worker of Josef, brings food to the invalid Josef and his wife Marie, who are Czechs. Josef hates the Nazis. When Josef finds David, who had escaped a concentration camp in occupied Poland after first being sent to the Theresienstadt concentration camp in northern Bohemia, Josef and Marie decide to hide him in their apartment. Horst makes an unannounced visit, bringing presents as usual. Marie is ambivalent about their secret: On one hand she never misses an opportunity to blame her husband for bringing in the Jew, but on the other she is merciful and sympathetic with the poor kid locked in the closet day and night. She suggests that Josef accepts Horst's job offer evicting Czech Jews from their homes, so as to get more protection and deflect possible suspicions. Josef accepts and is considered a collaborator by the neighbor Franta (who had tried to give David over to the Nazi authorities, when he first escaped from a concentration camp). Marie spends the days learning French from David and getting more and more tender toward him. Horst's visits become more frequent, and one afternoon, he attempts to rape Marie.
In Vienna, Austria-Hungary, 1889, a magician named Eisenheim (Edward Norton) is arrested by Chief Inspector Walter Uhl (Paul Giamatti) of the Vienna Police during a magic show involving necromancy. Later, Uhl explains the story of Eisenheim's life to Crown Prince Leopold (Rufus Sewell).
In 1940s Czechoslovakia, Eliška is a nurse who works alongside her lover, Richard, a respected surgeon. Due to the rising pressure of the Nazis, an underground network has formed to help those in danger of persecution. Richard is one of several doctors taking part in the resistance while Eliška acts as a messenger between contacts.
Une interprétation tendre de la façon de gérer la question de la mort, traitée de façon simple, métaphorique et symbolique à travers la relation entre un petit garçon et son grand-père.
Découvrant que Tim, son petit ami, le trompe, Lukas part en Afrique du Sud pour travailler comme assistant photographe pour Bel Ami. Plusieurs modèles sont du voyage et partagent le même hôtel du Cap. Durant leur séjour, des couples se forment. Le film se termine par une scène d'orgie.
The story commences on the streets of Prague on a grey morning with commuters bustling about. We are introduced to the figure of an Everyman, played by Petr Čepek, a colourless figure emerging from a metro station. On his way home, the man encounters two men handing out flyers. It is a map of the city with a location marked in. He shrugs and discards it, returning to his lodging. As he opens the door, a black cockerel runs out. The man sits down to eat, cutting himself a slice of bread. He discovers an egg concealed inside the loaf. He cracks it open but it is empty. Suddenly the lights go out and the wind rises. Objects are thrown about the room. The commotion ceases; the man goes to the window and looks down to where the two men from earlier are staring up at him. One of them holds the cockerel. The man closes the blind and returns to the table, where he finds the map and, using his own map of the city, traces out the location marked.
Jan Dítě has been released from a Czech prison just before the very end of his 15-year sentence and is settling in a town near the border between Czechoslovakia and Germany. He occupies his time with rebuilding a deserted house, and begins to recall his past, where he says that his main wish in life was to be a millionaire. Jan begins his career as a frankfurter vendor at a railroad station, and quickly learns the power of money and the influence it exerts over people.
Karel Horák (Jan Hartl) and Božena Horáková (Veronika Žilková) are a childless couple and for medical reasons are doomed to remain so. While on vacation with their neighbors at a house in the country, Karel decides to buy the house at the suggestion of his neighbor. When he is fixing up the house, he digs up a tree stump that looks vaguely like a baby. He spends the rest of the evening cleaning it up and then presents it to his wife. She names the stump Otík and starts to treat it like a real baby. She then works out a plan to fake her pregnancy and becoming more and more impatient she speeds up the process and 'gives birth' one month early.
Un rêve tchèque est le projet de fin d'études de deux étudiants en cinéma. Ils montent un canular mettant en scène un faux supermarché. Dans la république tchèque post-communiste, les habitants n'ont qu'une envie : consommer. La campagne de publicité fait venir plusieurs milliers de personnes devant une simple bâche tendue représentant un supermarché et leur renvoyant la question sur leurs besoins de consommation.
In Prague, Mr. Pivonka, an unmarried man, buys some pornography from his local newsagent, Mr. Kula, and returns home. A postwoman, Mrs. Malková gives him a letter which reads "On Sunday" in cut-out letters. In secret, she then rolls pieces of bread into little balls and carries them in her satchel. Pivonka asks his neighbour, Mrs. Loubalová, to slaughter a chicken for him. Using the leftover feathers and papier-mâché made from the pornography, he constructs a chicken head and fabricates wings made from umbrellas. Meanwhile, police captain Beltinsky buys rolling pins and pan lids from the same shop that sells Pivonka's umbrellas. Using these items, plus stolen pieces of fur and sharp things, Beltinsky constructs unusual objects in his workshop. His wife, a newsreader named Beltinska, feels neglected and buys some live carp. She is unaware that Kula is in love with her image and has constructed a machine rigged to stroke and masturbate him when she is on television. Pivonka and Loubalová construct life-size effigies of each other.
Film de semi animation complètement déjanté que nous propose Jan Švankmajer. On nous y présente un homme qui fait d’étranges rêves et qui consultera une psychanalyste pour tenter de les interpréter. Ces rêves lui permettent de côtoyer un homme qui lui ressemble, mais en plus jeune, et une jeune femme qu’il aimerait bien rencontrer dans le monde réel. D’ailleurs, à un certain point, le rêve et la réalité ne se confondent-ils pas? Il y a aussi cette maladie d’acheter des billets de loterie en pensant qu’il va gagner une fortune..
Josef Tkaloun is a teacher at a high school in Prague who cannot control his anger when his pupils misbehave in his poetry class. He quits his job and despite his wife urging him to retire, becomes a cycle courier. After an inevitable accident, he still refuses to stay at home and takes a job in the local Žižkov supermarket. He works behind a counter, recycling glass beer bottles. He begins to flirt with the customers and matchmake both for an old friend and for the man he works with. His own flirtations (and sexually charged dreams) almost get him into trouble with his wife, so he resolves to reignite the passion in his marriage by celebrating his wedding anniversary with a hot air balloon ride. The scary balloon ride, ending in crash, revitalizes the relationship.