Summer cinema— 
Joachim, put him into the machine!

SUM­MER CIN­E­MA IN THE KASÁR­NA COURT­YARD IS BACK!

Prac­ti­cal information:
—sound will be trans­mit­ted via headphones
—we’re hap­py to lend you blan­kets on site
—in case of rain, the screen­ing will be can­celed; tick­ets will remain valid and a new date will be announced in time
—tick­et capac­i­ty: 200
—tick­et price: 150 CZK

Joachim, Put Him into the Machine!
Oldřich Lip­ský — Czech Repub­lic — 2019 (orig­i­nal 1974) — 95 min­utes — Czech with Eng­lish subtitles

A kind-heart­ed coun­try boy, Fran­tišek Koudel­ka, moves to Prague for work. Before leav­ing, he pur­chas­es a ​“con­di­tion-o-gram” — a per­son­al­ized chart print­ed by a com­put­er based on his birth date, pre­dict­ing suc­cess­ful, risky, or out­right dan­ger­ous days. He lands a job at a car repair shop, thanks to his ener­getic, wid­owed aunt who also rents him a room. The mechan­ics there reg­u­lar­ly take hefty bribes from cus­tomers, and some even go mad from the flood of cash. But shy Fran­tišek is immune — he strict­ly fol­lows his con­di­tion-o-gram, which also becomes his guide in the pur­suit of affec­tion from Blan­ka, a shop assis­tant. How­ev­er, he faces com­pe­ti­tion in the form of bar­tender Karel and must wait for his pre­cise­ly cal­cu­lat­ed lucky day to make his move.

This was the first screen­play writ­ten by the leg­endary duo Zdeněk Svěrák and Ladislav Smol­jak. Over­flow­ing with cre­ative ideas, the film right­ful­ly belongs among the gems of Czech com­e­dy — not only for its charm­ing scenes and unfor­get­table dia­logue but also for its spot-on cast­ing. Lead­ing the ensem­ble is a then 29-year-old Luděk Sob­o­ta in his first major film role.