Czech cinema of the 60s and early 70s experienced, like much of the world, a kind of renaissance in film. What makes Czech cinema unique, when compared to French or British cinema at the time (aside from the fact that practically nothing is said about Czech cinema *before* this New Wave) is just how vastly diverse the Czech cinema of the day is...and while there are some truly unusual films, I don’t think any of them are weirder than this. Describing Valerie’s ‘plot’ in the most basic terms is next to impossible, but here it goes: a young girl experiences intense symbollic daydreams; a mixture of symbollic sexual nightmares and childish fantasy, spurred by her first period and an ascension into adulthood.
It’s a beguiling film, to say the least, from the very first innocently mischevious glance that Valerie gives the camera, and the first appearance of the Weasel emerging blood-soaked from a chicken coop with his prey in his mouth. The film consists largely of her bewildering fantasies; frenzied dreams and daydreams which not only seem to follow no logical trajectory but which blend in seamlessly with the “reality” of the film, if it can be accused of having such. Even on second viewing, its hard to make “sense” of it all...recurring characters take up new guises and situations, shifting suddenly as if by the whim of its protaganist; resulting in a film that seems composed of half-finished fragments of fantasies. Valerie is never portrayed as anything more than an archetype; that of a 13 year old girl. She’s given no deep development as a character, and the images that make up her fantasies are highly symbollic.
Visually, the film is a stunner. Its that rare color film which is both ravishingly beautiful; making use of an incredibly wide range of all colors, and yet whose palette is subdued. Not content to be a candy colored gothic delight; akin to what you might think of when reading Alice in Wonderland (Carol was indeed an influence on the film’s surrealist source novel), the film seems to be shrouded in a veil, rendering its images both palpable and strangely aloof. Though the film’s images suggest horror, there’s little real gore...with the closest to it being dead animals, and a glistening drop of blood or two on a daisy. Flashes of white; the principal color of a blossoming young bourgeois virgin, permeate the film as well, and Valerie is almost always in white. Much of the film is shot in natural settings or actual places, as opposed to sets (I believe), but all are imbued with a highly artificial quality. And the film's editting patterns are just as fragmented as the rest of the film; making it quite a sensual overload at times. Much of the film’s tone and surreal nature owe more to writer and designer Ester Krumbachová. She worked on two other classics of surreal Czech cinema; The Party and the Guests and Daisies (among many others; those are the two I've seen), and director Jaromil Jires and others have often said she was essential to their films' vision. He’s a significant film maker of the Czech cinema before this one, though this is his only film I’ve seen.
But somehow, despite being a collection of ‘similar’ fragments, Valerie and Her Week of Wonders feels like a complete experience, as well as an utterly unique one. Despite the narrative incoherance of the dream images in the film, they operate with the same cast of characters who always have the same (sinister, usually) goals, and they also operate under similar themes. The villainous Weasel (Tchor); an amorphous being who takes on several roles and guises but usually appears as a white faced monster (a cross between Death from The Seventh Seal and Count Orlock from Nosferatu; truly the film’s most memorable visual figure) and her grandmother (who also takes on many forms) are authority figures; restrictive beings who form both the heart and the opposition of Valerie’s dreams, and represent social forces of sexual repression. And, conversely, sexual perversion. On the other hand, our 4th principal character is the Eagle (Orlik), is a young male her age and represents a somewhat more positive sexual existence; a friend and companion whom she often saves, and he often does the same in turn. Though even he is imbued with uneasiness.
The film is highly sexually charged, but there’s nothing pleasant or erotic about any of its figures and their sexual aims; ranging from normal heterosexual desire, to lesbianism to obvious predatory pedophilia. There’s no actual sex; one can only imagine Valerie doesn’t quite know what sex *is* and therefore her dreams have only suggestion. The relationship of the character’s add yet another level to the film’s already twisted sexual politics. It is suggested at many points that Orlik is Valerie’s brother, her grandmother’s intentions towards Valerie are often sexually charged, and it is often suggested that the vampiric Tchor (who takes on several roles; including a constable and a missionary, as well as an actual weasel) is both Valerie and Orlik’s father, adding a level of incestual curiosity to the film’s dreamlike structure.
Its hard to take a middle ground on this film. Personally, I think I love it. I tend to have rather mixed feelings on intensely surrealist films; I think El Topo and Holy Mountain are great cinema but I never want to watch them again. But Valerie just works for me. It’s a thing of weird beauty; its feverish pace and story rendering it ever elusive and yet utterly transfixing, denying any sort of clear reading...and damn it all, its just a blast to watch, without a slow or dull moment. Like Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, it has a feverish quality to it, and a visual otherworldliness. It’s a strange, twisted child fairytale, and its played out in an intoxicating, unsettling, bewildering and charming fashion. Horror buffs and lovers of weird films should run, not walk.
94 / 100
Released in the UK by Second Run, one of my favorite little companies. They’ve done a stellar job with the film’s transfer, preserving the film’s original 1.33:1 aspect ratio and presenting its unique color palette quite crisply and progressively. The extras are small compared to what Criterion might do, but its one of the meatier discs for this company. We have a short interview with young Jaroslava Schallerova, the star of the film who would remain active in film during the 70s. We also have a 20 minute piece by British film scholar Michael Brooke, which is a very knowledgeable piece about the film’s place in Czech cinema, its director’s ouevre, and the film’s production as a whole. Considering the price; its usually found for lower than its measly £12.99 retail (approximately $20 US) at the time of this review, it’s a great bargain, and it would be hard for me to *not* recommend this DVD with all my heart to the adventurous movie goer. I think there is a Facets DVD in the US, and though I’ve heard its one of their few watchable discs, region free is the way to go.
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