Larks on a String (35mm)

(Skrivánci na niti, Jirí Menzel, Czechoslovakia 1969, 94 min., 35mm, Czech with English subtitles)

Private moments are hard to come by in post-war Czechoslovakia. Whether it’s the recitation of a poem, a philosophical conversation, the playing of a saxophone, or a simple flirtation, all are looked on with suspicion by the government and its agents. Following a group of “bourgeois” citizens forced to work in a scrapyard connected to a women’s prison, Larks on a String takes a critical view of the country’s Communist regime. A professor, a prosecutor, a dairyman, a barber, and a cook toil to destroy the emblems of the past while the administration sets up photo ops and romance blossoms across the fence. Made in 1969 but banned until after the Velvet Revolution, master Czech director Menzel (Closely Watched Trains) explores the personal cost of totalitarianism.