Requiem for a Maiden/Requiem pro panenku (1991)

Thursday / 5th October 2006 / 20:00

Czech Republic / 1991 / 99 minutes / director: Filip Renč / screenplay: Filip Renč, Igor Chaun (based on a report by Josef Klíma) / cinematography: Juraj Fándli / editing: Jan Mattlach / music: Ondřej Soukup / cast: Anna Geislerová (Marika), Barbora Hrzánová (Johanka), Soňa Valentová (Volfová), Eva Holubová (Krocová) /

There are two kinds of films - those that are pleasant and those like Requiem for a Maiden. A film that attacks you and leaves you exhausted and depressed. Requiem tells a story based on real events. After her father´s assault, and due to an administrative mistake, the main character, fourteen-year-old Marika is moved to hospital for mentally affected adolescents. She suffers from post-traumatic shock but from the very start of her stay it is obvious that she does not belong in there. What she sees in the hospital is pure horror, beyond imagination. She encounters every possible means of man´s humiliation. The girl patients are being drugged all the time without considering their actual condition, and handled with unprecedented cruelty. Nobody is responding to Marika´s constant protests against the unbearable situation. However what seemed to be utmost horror is nothing compared to the night which ends it all.

If you think about it, it is quite unusual to start one´s career with this kind of film. On one hand it is brave and undoubtedly courageous to take a script based on a true story and shoot it as your first feature film. On the other hand there are several risks that go hand in hand with such a decision. One of them is the very question of an audience: who would like to watch such a depressive film? Renč´s depiction of true events is realistic, disturbing and scary at the same time. And I would say that the effect is even more scary today than at the time the film was shot. It seems to be not only a depiction of what happened in one hospital for mentally affected adolescents but more like a metaphor of the era as a whole. Frightening in its morbidity and silent accepting of injustice happening in the country. Renč makes this world look as unpleasant as possible, being significantly helped by his collaborators - the director of cinematography Juraj Fándli and composer Ondřej Soukup. And I guarantee you that you will not want this soundtrack to become part of your favourite music collection. The same holds for the film. It is a kind of film that you will always want to forget but that you will actually never be able to. Whether it is good or bad, is up to you to decide.

Štefan Titka