KVIFF to Present Premiere of Digitally Restored Version of Ecce Homo Homolka

​The long-running tradition of premiere screenings of digitally restored Czech and Czechoslovak films continues at KVIFF 59 with a screening of screenwriter and director Jaroslav Papoušek’s Ecce Homo Homolka.

This sarcastic 1969 comedy about the life of a multigenerational family has been called the final film of the Czechoslovak New Wave of the 1960s. Jaroslav Papoušek, who was originally active as a sculptor, artist, and cartoonist, worked as a screenwriter on Miloš Forman’s seminal films Black Peter, Loves of a Blonde, and The Firemen’s Ball and Ivan Passer’s Intimate Lighting. After Forman and Passer went into exile, Papoušek was the last member of this exceptionally talented creative trio to remain on the domestic film scene. And although, in terms of genre, Ecce Homo Homolka belongs to the category of so-called folk comedies, it clearly follows on his work with Forman and Passer and the poetic style of their previous collaborative efforts.

An idyllic summer afternoon, when Grandma and Grandpa Homolka, their son Ludva, their daughter-in-law Heduš, and their twin grandchildren are on a trip to the countryside, slowly turns into an outlandish comic satire that reveals the pitfalls of living together in a small apartment, full of petty quarrels, grievances, and divergent ideas of what a happy family life should look like. The film’s strength rests in its brilliant depiction of distinctive character types, its accurate portrayal of an ordinary Czech family in the 1960s, and the use of situational humor and extremely witty dialogue. Many of the film’s lines have become so popular over the years that they have become unforgettable catchphrases for later generations of viewers as well.

When casting his film, the director relied mainly on the acting talents of Josef Šebánek, Helena Růžičková, František Husák, and Marie Motlová. The twins are played by Matěj and Petr Forman. Papoušek shot a loose sequel, Hogo Fogo Homolka, the following year, and the final part of the trilogy, Homolka and the Purse, was added in 1972.

Ecce Homo Homolka is another in a series of award-winning Czech films to be digitally restored thanks to financial support from Milada and Eduard Kučera. The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival regularly includes re-release premieres of films whose digital restoration has been made possible by the Kučeras in its official program and as part of its special KVIFF Classics retrospectives.

The film was digitally restored by UPP and Soundsquare, working in collaboration with the National Film Archive and the State Fund for Cinema. The image was digitized from an original negative of the print and an original negative of the sound stored at the National Film Archive.