Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1974)

A Masterpiece!

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Sweet and virginal young lass Valerie (well played with wide-eyed charm to spare by the delicately fetching Jaroslava Schallerova) undergoes a sexual awakening in a strange, yet sensual fantasy land where she runs afoul of a creepy vampiric being known as Polecat (a marvelously sinister portrayal by Jiri Prymek) and gets accused by the superstitious locals of witchcraft.Director Jaromil Jires, who also co-wrote the thoughtful script with Ester Krumbachova, does a masterful job of crafting a beguilingly dreamy and surreal atmosphere that's bristling with dark emotions, barely suppressed carnal desires, and severe religious repression. Moreover, Jire not only manages the remarkable feat of presenting a genuinely arousing mood that never becomes too explicit or remotely exploitative, but also delivers a potent and provocative central message on the impossibility of preserving a state of childlike innocence for perpetuity. Petr Kopriva contributes a likable turn as Valerie's smitten boyfriend Eaglet while Helena Anyzova does impressive work in the dual roles of both Valerie's stern grandmother and wicked aunt Elsa. Jan Curik's sumptuous cinematography offers a wealth of striking poetic imagery. Lubos Fiser's gentle folkloric score hits the harmonic spot. Recommended viewing for fans of esoteric cinematic fare.

Second Run DVD brought out an excellent edition of this film in 2008. It's a new digital transfer that, while not quite up to Criterion standards, does justice to this criminally neglected film. Nice extra features, too: an informative introduction by film historian Michael Brooke; an interview with Jaroslava Schallerova (Valerie); and a superb booklet, containing an in-depth essay and a lovely appreciative piece by Joseph A. Gervasi of Exhumed Films. This dream of a film seems to have been a one-off for director Jaromil Jires, whose other films - from what I've read - appear to be more conventional in scope. There are so many films that deserve to be consigned to the celluloid bonfire. This is not one of them. Well done, Second Run!

Valerie is a thirteen year old girl, orphaned at a young age and now living with her grendmother. One morning she tells her grandmother that she is no longer a girl and that with the onset of her period she has now become a woman and thus begins Valerie's surreal adventures in life, love, religion and just a little bit of horror. As a group of travelling players arrive in town, one of their leaders seems familiar, he reveals himself to Valerie's grandmother as her former lover and Valerie's long dead father. The grandmother is staggered at the youthful complexion of the man (actually a vampire), he offers her, her youth back in return for her home and Valerie's soul, she agrees. Thus develops the flimsy plot in this Alice in Wonderland like fantasy of a girls sexual awakening. The film is sumptuously filmed, in dazzling dreamscapes of innocence and horror, little of it makes any sense but the film never the less sweeps up the viewer in a hypnotic stream of consciousness that is hard to escape. Valerie though does escape unscathed from all her escapades, including vampires, attempted rape by a priest and a burning at the stake, all thanks to her special talismanic earrings, left to her by her mother. Amidst all this the film also boasts a beautifully evocative and even at times very twee score, that is just perfect for the visuals. The ending is wonderful and pure fairytale. I want to watch it again, right away.

This came to me yclept "The Valerie Project" as a buncha Yank musicians turned down the soundtrack and cranked up their own (it's got subtitles, so why not?) This made it an Event, and a highly enjoyable event it was. But what counted was the movie itself, which ain't no tractor movie although it was made under the watchful eyes of Soviet occupation in late sixties Czechoslovakia. What it is is a surrealist pedophile vampire movie, with that inimitably Czech edge of absurd creepiness. The rhythms are all angular, the camera placements gratuitously audacious, and the acting is as bizarrely theatrical as the makeup, with a bad-toothed road company Max Schreck scooting around town and helping Valerie's unconvincingly aged grandmother rediscover her lost and horny youth. The imagery is so compellingly sensual that you don't really get too worried about the fetishization of the 13-year-old protagonist - it's more Alice in Wonderland than Stealing Beauty, and anyway everything else is so utterly upside-down, you don't have time to think about it. It's totally nuts, and a great time was had by all. Before the screening a Czech diplomat came out to assure everyone that "Not all people from our country are vampires"!