Bohemia Docta or The Labyrinth of the World and the Lust-house of the Heart (A Divine Comedy)

synopsis

Egon Bondy prophesies an inferno of global capitalism, Jim Čert admits to collaborating with the secret police, Jaroslav Foglar can’t find a bottle-opener for his beer, while Ivan Diviš makes observations about his own funeral. Director Jiří Krejčík can’t make movies and has a go at Vachek in front of the camera instead. In mid-battle, Karel Vachek goes down on his knees before the inventor of Semtex. This is the Czech Republic at the end of the 1990s. Vachek’s extensive film essay, examining the state and hidden mycelium of Czech scholarship, develops into a strange natural metaphor. The woodlands of Czech thought are interwoven, sustained and influenced by unseen threadlike hyphae, thanks to which even those that seemed withered and destroyed rise from the dead once more. The film itself becomes part of this process.

biography

Karel Vachek (1940) creates multi-layered philosophical and social essays. In 2004, he published the book The Theory of Matter. Films: Moravian Hellas, 1963, Elective Affinities, 1968, New Hyperion or Liberty, Equality, Brotherhood, 1992, What Is to Be Done? (A Journey from Prague to Český Krumlov, or How I Formed a New Government, 1996, Bohemia Docta or The Labyrinth of the World and the Lust-house of the Heart A Divine Comedy, 2000, Who Will Watch the Watchman? Dalibor, or the Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin, 2002, Obscurantist and His Lineage or The Pyramids’ Tearful Valleys, 2011.

more about film

director:	Karel Vachek
cast:	John Bok, Egon Bondy, Vratislav Brabenec, Stanislav Brebera, Eugen Brikcius, Jim Čert, Ivan Dejmal, Ivan Diviš, Pavel Dostál, Jaroslav Foglar
script:	Karel Vachek
photography:	Karel Slach
editing:	Renata Pařezová