Laputa

Tereza Voříšková’s character is very real and believable, but it doesn’t help her much, she is stuck in a circle and her pub Laputa is full of Andy Warhol style artists. This movie is obviously made by artists for other artists. It is trying to be realistic, but it gets lost in the thoughts that will get immediately condemned by the average audience. (12/06/2018)

Yesterday night I turned on a movie that had to grab me within five minutes, otherwise I would fall asleep. And although I didn't play any action thriller, I endured and enjoyed this unassuming piece. I have also always wanted to have a café island like the one Johanka got, for which Terezka deserved at least a nomination for the Lion, unfortunately in the same year Alena Mihulová returned to the cinema screens. The male cast also showed themselves, Stach is always excellent, but for example Orozovič's performance I liked for the first time. Overall, a very nice, intimate film without a rushing plot, but with several nice thoughts and a pleasant melancholic touch. (10/07/2016)

A clueless expression of cluelessness. If not for the mature camerawork and the assiduous acting of Tereza Voříšková, I would be searching in vain for a single reason why Laputa would not be shown on broadcast television on a Sunday evening instead of in cinemas. In fact, many low-budget television productions have an incomparably more sophisticated dramaturgical structure, better-developed characters, more convincing dialogue and greater storytelling value. Whereas Hana’s other recent generational statement managed to impress at least with its bold technical execution, Laputa has nothing with which to fill or cover up its content void. The film is just as tiresome and tiring as its weakling protagonist, who does nothing, deals with nothing, strives for nothing and changes nothing (the only major decision that she makes comes out of the blue and ultimately doesn’t bring about any change anyway). One of the few disruptions to her routine of surviving from day to day is when the boiler leaks, but she accepts it with the same apathy as she does all other events. While characters appear and disappear (some quite illogically after the midpoint of the film), nothing changes. Just more conversations about fire, water and the inability to do anything with oneself. You can probably understand that, regardless of the creative intent (to somehow convey the protagonist’s sense of resignation to us), this is about as comparably entertaining as watching paint dry. Johanka stereotypically and futilely seeks happiness in a variously committed relationship with one of her approximately five casual partners/friends, mostly self-centred jackasses (one is a jealous idiot, another sometimes deliberately cuts his own palm, yet another appears as unexpectedly as he leaves) who will most likely blend together in your mind just as the content and the mood of the film’s individual scenes do. The only sensible, practical man is a dad with a wife and two sons. I don’t know whether or not to take from this the lesson that only parenthood will make you a purposeful human being – especially since Johanka’s mother is clearly not okay. It’s fine that the narrative monotony is matched by subdued camerawork with muted colours and impressively “tired” and usually static compositions (only the scenes at the grandmother’s house and the single scene in Laputa, when it seems that Johanka has finally taken the right direction, are brighter), but if the film (and its characters) lack rhythm and pace, it doesn’t matter how faithfully you transfer that absence into the visual aspect. 35% (11/10/2015)

The entire film feels like a competition where the viewer has an hour and a half to guess what Voříšková's character's intentions are (a few minutes in, it becomes clear that they're certainly not business-related). The answer is that there are no intentions; she’s simply going through experiences, in different forms and lengths, similar to what most of us have gone through or will go through during adolescence. It's a time of fun, experiences, scraping by, and fragile independence, delaying the inevitable moment we don’t want to admit is coming—standing at a crossroads and figuring out what we actually want, ideally by our own choice. The barbecue scenes with the handyman neighbor’s family and the final one showing a glimpse of Laputa "from the outside" only confirm what's been criticized about the plot - a lack of direction, aimlessness, no purpose or transformation. Yes, that’s exactly what we've been talking about this whole time. In this Czech attempt at Trees Lounge, I see the problem more in the handling of the characters, who may have been drawn from the authors’ experiences and attempts at stylization, but often didn’t seem authentic to me and lacked the feeling that they were in front of a camera. In any case, it’s not for someone who works shifts as a laborer and goes to the pub five times a week to complain about everything from Prague to Brussels. And yet, paradoxically, they are living a similar life, just in a paler shade of brown. (29/08/2022)

I can't help it, for me, this is a classic Czech film that leaves me cringing. The actors want it to be interesting, they think it has something to say, and it's even symbolic with references to classic literature, but it's really just about how we fail to live our lives. Perhaps it’s not a bad theme, but I didn't like this rendition. (08/08/2017)