Bad Joke 3

Real folk entertainment, the pinnacle of bad taste, or just a reflection of societal wit in the realm of folk humor? When I gave Bad Joke 2 two stars, I had a glimmer of hope for better times. However, Zdeněk Troška presents irrefutable evidence of his directorial impotence. No, he's not a bad director because of what he films, but because of how he films. For an hour and three-quarters, I was incredulously shaking my head at how someone could juxtapose absolutely brilliant jokes with the most dull and unfunny ones. He cut the branch under himself that had the strongest structure of the entire (thankfully, very poor) tree. Of course, there may not be much of a story, but there is definitely a solid central point to the whole narrative. With surprisingly coherent decency, the film presents jokes about gypsies, but immediately afterward (un)intentionally pushes the envelope when it awkwardly confronts the moralizing subtext about the Czech attitude towards this ethnic minority. No, the state of society is not what he managed to present in his film, even though he clearly intended to do so. He will be criticized for this, because he was trying to tell something he couldn't. But the anger and resentment also give way to jokes that fill the remaining part of the "film." Their quality can be doubted just as well as the director's execution. Perhaps if Troška had taken the camera and gone for a little walk around Prague, he might have captured much more humor than what the actors recited in front of the camera. There’s nothing left to do but cry. Perhaps only Josef Laufer deserves special praise for his perfect Leo Kohn, although not everyone can stand his endless lamenting. To summarize, it seems that despite Troška bringing jokes to the film that were missing in the previous two installments, he crossed the line between awkwardness and humor at completely different moments than he intended. Let's hope he's done with this topic for good, even though his reflections on serious projects evoke even more goosebumps than the fact that Bad Joke 4 is on its way with new jokes that have never been seen before. (25/06/2005)

Zdeněk Troška is a black hole. In the beginning there was talent, in the temporary end... what to call it? A desert, an absolute wasteland, incredible dilettantism, zero leading of the actors (even the old woman from Hoštice acts better than the local "professionals"!), no script (the hint of a plot with a football match evokes the script stage of decomposition according to the motto: I'll have seven beers and one green shot), foully routine, and perhaps only one place where a person laughs at something so embarrassing because it’s just not possible without emotion, and if the viewer does not want to cry or nibble on furniture with rage, he just convulses his mouth. In short, soulless coloring books for television entertainment viewers. I am engraving this on my tombstone: "he persevered until the end, looking for a joke and somewhere along the line he went thirsty and hungry, because rubble cannot be eaten". Goodbye, Kameňák, and for God’s sake please don’t return from the realm of fairy-tale debility and the realm of senile actor debris. (25/05/2006)

The local media reports that "K3 actually has a story" overcame my reservations so much that I let myself be convinced by the enthusiastic family reviews of the TV show and I ended up watching it – to deeply regret it after the "modern" cuts of the football match and the shots of Monika Absolonová. I might be a little proud of myself for earnestly enduring the entire trilogy, but the viewer's masochism is still the same. (01/01/2006)