Přítelkyně z domu smutku (TV series) (1992)

Original title

Přítelkyně z domu smutku

Directed by

Hynek Bočan

Genre

drama, drama film

Country

Czechoslovakia

Length

1 season, 4 episodes

Rating

5.4 of 10 from 5 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A woman is held in a remand prison in Communist-era Czechoslovakia. The series follows her and her fellow female inmates, showing why they are there and what their lives are like inside.

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What happens

Přítelkyně z domu smutku (Czech: My Companions in the Bleak House is a 1992 four-part Czech miniseries starring Ivana Chýlková. It was based on a book of the same name by Eva Kantůrková. The book has autobiographical features - the author was imprisoned for almost a year in the detention prison Prague-Ruzyně when she was accused of a crime of subversion of the republic. In the end, she was released and the trial never took place (it was just another of the Communist regime's tricks to keep people inconvenient to it in check). In the series, the main character does not directly bear the author's name. Instead, she is referred to as Mrs. Marta. Series was awarded at the MTF in Cannes by the Grand Silver Prize in the series category and by the Grand Gold Prize for the acting performance of Ivana Chylková. The series, filmed in an authentic prison environment, has episodes: 1. House of Sorrow. 2. The Andes. 3. Helga. 4. Girlfriend from the house of sorrow. The story depicts life in a remand prison and the fate of female inmates – why they got into prison, what crime they committed, if they committed any at all, what kind of environment they come from, etc. Their purely criminal offenses contrast with the "criminal activity" of the main character, who goes to prison she got only for publishing her books abroad, but which the other female inmates think is a big case against them. Both the book and the series describe in detail the author's feelings in prison; in the series, more emphasis is placed on describing the interrogations with the investigator. However, through the description of individual characters and their fates and behavior after imprisonment, the reality of life under socialism in the 1970s and 1980s in the Czechoslovak Republic, including the unequal position of women in society and the manipulation of the truth by law enforcement agencies, is presented in detail. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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