Kybernetická babicka (1962)

... aka: Cyber Grandma

... aka: Cybernetic Grandmother, The

... aka: Die Oma vom anderen Stern (The Grandma from the Other World)

Directed by:

Jiří Trnka

They can speak like us. They can say all the right words and do all the right things. They can teach us everything we need to know. They probably make fewer mistakes. And they can claim to feel things and care about us and nurture us and pacify us and put on an impressive almost-human-like show of compassion and emotion. But can they actually fully replace us? This eerie sci-fi tale, which is as timely as ever despite being made over sixty years ago, theorizes that they indeed cannot. "They," in this case, being robots, cyborgs, androids, cyber-whatevers; machinery and computers programmed to replace human beings by duplicating what humans typically do in their day-to-day lives but also mimicking the assumed correct things humans should say. Despite being less prone to error, age, illness and the complexities of the human psyche, there isn't and likely will never be a suitable artificial replacement for family and friends of the human variety, says Trnka. After marveling at technology, taking advantage of it and playing with all of the cool new toys in a futuristic world, sometimes all you really need is a hug from your grandma.

At a small cottage, a grandmother and her beloved young granddaughter receive a message from the girl's absent mother delivered by a drone-like device. There's a lot to gouge about the coldness of technological advancement from this one brief message alone. The girl isn't referred to by name, even by her own mother. Instead, she's "the kid" and is given her new identification number, ACH028. And then there's the fact the mother automatically assumes the little girl must be bored staying with her old-fashioned and tech illiterate grandmother in her simple country cottage. After all, she prefers her quiet, simple life and doesn't even bother with all of the dazzling gadgets available to this advanced society. However, little does the mother know, her daughter is already perfectly content with her red ball and the affection she receives from her loving granny. Nonetheless, the message orders the girl be delivered to her new home.

The trip there is a journey through a graveyard of advancements past. A paved roadway is no longer used because cars are no longer used, TV sets, airplanes, weaponry and other commonly used things of the previous generations sit around covered in cobwebs. Once they arrive at their destination, the sad, scared girl is given her number, says goodbye to her grandma and is then whisked away to her new home, which may be somewhere in space for all we know. Just like any other product, she finds herself on a conveyor belt and is then placed in an egg-shaped glass pod that entertains her with machine-generated music as lights and other pods travel around a complex system where seemingly meaningless numbers, letters and symbols constantly flash. It's all impressive, yet cold, confusing, impersonal and sterile.

Finally arriving at her destination, the girl discovers her new home cavernous, quiet and deserted. Both of her astronaut parents are away; mom on some "geological expedition" and dad back on the moon. Left in their place to babysit is a robot (voiced by Otýlie Benísková) who's been programmed to behave just like a grandmother; even physically designed for that purpose to resemble a comforting chair with angel-like doily wings. "She" insists there's no reason to be scared, assures the girl it loves her, wants the girl to call it grandma and is equipped with all kinds of annoying old school phrases like like "A healthy mind is a healthy body!" and "Cleanliness is next to godliness!" When it comes time to scold ("Leaning out the window is strictly forbidden!"; "Sit straight!") it does so in the same artificially chipper tone. It coaxes her into a bathroom where robot arms do all of the cleaning for her and then sits her down for a bedtime story that involves murder and dismemberment. Needless to say, the girl is distrustful and horrified, but her story ends on a hopeful and heartwarming note.

This is another gem from influential Czech animator Trnka that I probably should have watched a lot sooner since I'd previously loved his allegorical short THE HAND (1965). His trademark combination of stop motion animation and puppetry is put to visually striking effect here, with unique, brilliant designs for this futuristic world, as well as an important message delivered in a concise and affecting way. Even more impressively, this is able to relay its exact intentions to the audience with surprisingly little dialogue, instead focusing on the visuals and sound design, with Jan Novák's varied score, alternately whimsical and disquieting / horrific, ably supporting the scenario.

Since we've already moved into an age where people are not only somewhat disconnected from nature and the outside world, but also somewhat disconnected from other human beings, what this has to say is even more relevant now than it was back in 1962. While the flesh-and-blood grandma may be slower and more feeble, she has the advantage of interpersonal wisdom and nuance gained through lived experience. Her genuine affection for her granddaughter is not something a computer can exactly or believably duplicate, just as the granddaughter is intuitively more receptive to love coming from an organic place that feels earned and authentic as opposed to a manufactured one.

★★★1/2

Byt (1968)

... aka: Flat, The

Directed by:

Jan Svankmajer

Ever have one of those days where something bad or annoying happens, and then something else bad or annoying happens immediately after the first bad or annoying thing and then you just have to stop everything, stand there for a few seconds and take a deep breath just because you know if a third bad or annoying happens in such quick succession it may send you over the edge? Now imagine yourself trapped in a room where nothing works right and everything contained therein seems specifically designed just to annoy you.

A door opens and a man (Ivan Kraus) rolls inside a small, dingy, one room flat. The door then sews itself shut. He crawls around on the floor following chalk arrows, which first lead up to a doorway with a tattered blanket hanging over it. After slipping inside for a bathroom break, he crawls back out and continues following the arrows to another door. When he tries to open it and leave, the handle breaks off. He finds a mirror on the wall, but it casts a backwards reflection so he can only see the back of his head. When he attempts to light a furnace, water gushes out. He next moves on to a pair of framed photos on the wall. One is crooked, the other is straight. When he adjusts the crooked one, the straight one becomes crooked. Trying to step on a chair to adjust the crooked upper painting, the chair shrinks to where it's out of reach. And then the chair decides to beat him up. How long could you keep your sanity in this place?

A light bulb busts a hole through the wall. Possible escape route? Nope, a gloved fist pops out to punch him in the face. Well, at least there's some food on the table! Only the bread has been hollowed out by a rat, the soup spoon is filled with holes, a beer decides to shrink to a micro shot glass, an egg refuses to crack and a pack of dogs miraculously appear long enough to eat all of the potatoes. The man gets his hand stuck in a hole in the wall and then goes through a table and face splats into the soup. He would wash up... except that in lieu of water, the spigot produces a large rock that breaks the wash basin. Best one could do in this situation is perhaps sleep, but even lying still backfires when the bed reduces itself to pulp. Some nails strip him of his pants before Czech filmmaker Juraj Herz swings by in a last minute cameo as a man passing through the room holding a chicken and an axe.

People try to deduct different meanings from all this (partially because of the enigmatic final scene, which features many names scribbled on a wall [see if anything jumps out at you from the shots below]), while some deduct no meaning at all and just see this as a playful piece of surrealism. Either way, this 13-minute comedy (?) short is not recommended if you already suffer from high anxiety. As per the director's usual, things are spiced up with bits of stop motion animation throughout. There's also a great score from Zdenek Liska.

This has been released on numerous collections over the years. It's included in Kimstim's "The Collected Shorts of Jan Svankmajer" released in 2005 and the British Film Institute's "Jan Svankmajer: The Complete Short Films" released in 2007. It was also released as part of a VHS and DVD collection of the director's shorts released in Japan back in 2002.

★★★

Poslední lup (1987)

... aka: Last Theft, The

Directed by:

Jirí Barta

A thief (Ivan Vojtek) scales an iron fence, picks a lock and breaks into a large, seemingly empty country mansion. To his delight, the place is filled with all kinds of beautiful and expensive antiques. He starts stuffing his bag with coins, a golden clock, goblets, jewelry, pearls and whatever else strikes his fancy... but then things take a very strange turn. Sitting silently just feet from where he's snatching things is an entire family. There's an elderly woman (Frantisek Husák), an elderly man (Zdeněk Martínek), a young adult woman (Soňa Sladká), a young adult man (Martin Šafr) and a little girl (Nika Frouzová). They don't appear to be paying too much attention to him or what he's doing but the matriarch of the clan eventually invites him to join them at the table. Not sure what to make of these folks at first, he takes an apprehensive seat and then starts playing some kind of dice game that's sort of like Yahtzee but with a gambling element. And he keeps rolling high numbers over and over again, keeps winning over and over again and they keep handing over their cash. What luck! Eventually there's a mountain of money and jewelry in front of him. In fact, as the candles burn down, he soon realizes he's won all of their valuables. Perfect time for a celebratory drink, right?

The thief is poured a glass of wine. And then another. And then another. And then he's given a cigar. He's led away to the bathroom, where he's pampered and treated like a king. He's bathed and shaved and combed and gets a manicure. Fitted in a golden robe, he's led to his bedroom and fed grapes. But it all proves to be just a seductive ruse when the family reveal their true colors... and their intentions.

In a perfect world, horror anthologies would be filled with tales containing this high level of creativity and visual imagination instead of the derivative, flatly-presented and half-baked shorts that usually populate those films. I mean, when you're working in a limited time frame, why in the world would you even try to cram 90 minutes worth of narrative material into 20 or 30 minutes while completely ignoring the visual components? What Barta does here is take a rather simple premise (though it may be more along the lines of a deceptively simple allegory) and lets his creativity run wild when it comes to the aesthetics and atmosphere, resulting in a superlative, eerie Gothic mood piece packed with so much visual detail it's impossible to soak it all in in one viewing. In fact, after I viewed this, I immediately went back and watched it all over again.

One of the most striking things here is the unique and spellbinding use of color. Many shots are black-and-white or monochrome (shades of blue and green predominant), but then others are hand-colored like those creepy old faded / artificial-looking "enhanced" photos that were popular in the turn of the century. Certain single shots also start out colorless and then become colored to match what is occurring on screen.

It's no coincidence the color scheme is so varied as nearly everything about this film is calculated to feel just a little bit off. Superimposition and surrealistic elements are frequently employed, frame rates are playfully tinkered with, slowed down or sped up (which makes this live-action tale fit right in with the director's usual stop-motion work) and the editing is slowed down at times but frenzied at other moments. You can get a good idea just how intricate and carefully-crafted this is by pausing your way through the flash-edited gambling sequence, which reveals a great amount of detail in each individual shot.

Barta is best known for Krysař / The Pied Piper (1986), which tells its story using Expressionistic designs, creepy-looking wood-carved figures and stop motion animation and is now considered a masterpiece of Czech cinema. It, as well as this one and most of Barta's early other shorts are included on the box set Jirí Barta: Labyrinth of Darkness from The Kimstim Collection.

★★★1/2