Poupata

Czech film makers seem to prefer dark stories of human misery, weakness, and unhappiness. They make such pictures rather well, but it seems to be the only genre that they produce. This movie is true to this general mold. It's a story of a family that consists of the parents and teenage son and daughter. They seem to be caught in a web of hopelessness and despair, and there is pathetically little in their lives to give them joy. Their problems seem ordinary enough, but it's their attitudes of apathy that predicts that whatever the outcome, they will be unhappy. Only the son finds a brief moment of happiness with a stripper, but the viewer realizes that the boy is too naive to anticipate the course that relationship must take. I can find no fault with the movie other than its depressing message, which seems to be that "life sucks." The acting and the cinematography support well this general premise. The movie is well made and for this reason worth seeing. I just wish it was more upbeat, giving at least a glimmer of a "happy end".