On Parents and Children

A seemingly trivial situation: A son goes for a walk with his father. But, the son is in his forties, living his own life. The father is over 70. The only thing these two men seem to have in common is that they go for a walk together once a month. With brilliantly executed dialogue, the history of the 20th century and all its absurdities are revealed in front of our eyes. The relationship between a father and son has never been described in such an interesting way: Two grown-up men who respect, hate, and love each other, all at once. There is nothing extreme about it, but it is something intimately familiar to anyone who has lived long enough to be able to talk with their fathers in middle age. The destinies of both protagonists clash, mingle, and, immediately afterward, move away by centrifugal force. For a moment, they are friends, for a moment a father and son, and for a moment, they are complete strangers…

Synopsis

In the bitter comedy About Parents and Children, Vladimír Michálek presents an unusually conceived theme of family relationships. The novella of the same name by the leading contemporary Czech author Emil Hakl, which won the Magnesia Litera prize, is the model. In it, the writer captures the afternoon walk of a father (in his seventies) with his son (in his forties). Within, the two men "just" answer each other and recall various episodes from their cohabitation as well as stories they have heard or experienced. The script, on which Jiří Křižan worked in addition to the author and director, enriches the narrative with a parallel dialogue between the son's twenty-six-year-old companion Marta and his twenty-five-year-old son. There is also "dramatic" tension in their meeting, culminating in a sexual act. In addition to a precise description of the walk through Stromovka and its surroundings, the plot also includes short flashbacks, returning to various periods of the father's and son's lives (the father's memories of his own childhood and youth, the son's return to his boyhood years or his stories about cannibals or about getting to know his son, about whereas he had no idea until recently). It is in the memories that the traumas are revealed, with which both men somehow come to terms with and to which the theme of death is added. At the same time, the era and its historical upheavals are also remembered (e.g. in the story about the mother's second husband, the lampasák). The focus of the unusual film is the excellent interplay of the main actors Josef Somro and David Novotný, the quality of the "Hrabalov" dialogues and the unobtrusive emphasis on genia loci (in addition to Prague, the film was also shot in Slovakia's Martin and the Beskydy Mountains). – Another Czech writer Ivan Landsman flashes in an episodic role.