Completed - CZECH - Comedy - 88 minutes
Year of production : 2002 Director(s) : Petr ZELENKA Writer(s) : Petr ZELENKA Cast : Cechomor , Jaromir NOHAVICA Producer(s) : Pavel STRNAD
Meeting certain people can change our lives. Experiencing a miracle, finding an angel, or having intimate contact with alcohol can have the same effect. The Year of the Devil is a film which deals with such encounters. Recovering alcoholic Jan Holman comes to the Czech Republic to shoot a documentary about an alcohol treatment center. There he meets singer-songwriter Jaromír Nohavica and his ‘guardian angel’ Karel Plíhal. Karel Plíhal stages a rehearsal of his own funeral. The mournful procession is accompanied by the music of Čechomor. Plíhal is captivated by their energy and later recommends to Jaromír Nohavica that Čechomor play as his backup band. Karel Holas, Čechomor’s fiddle player, is employed by an upper-class hotel to entertain guests in the elevator. During one particular ride he plays for Sydney opera conductor Jaz Coleman, the ex-singer for the British band Killing Joke. Jaz offers Čechomor the chance to tour with the symphony. In the end, Čechomor opts for Nohavica. Nohavica’s recovery so fascinates Dutch documentarist Holman that he decides to shelve his original plans and follow the musicians on tour. What originally starts out as a normal concert tour soon ends up as a series of strange, sometimes supernatural experiences climaxing in a ritualistic ceremony at the bottom of a strip mine. The Year of the Devil is a film for people who can hear the melodies
Country(ies) : CZECH REPUBLIC