Daisies (1966) by Vera Chytilova
Saturday, February 21, 1987, 8:00 pm
The Surreal World of Vera Chytilova
Vera Chytilova emerged from the same Czechoslovakian renaissance which produced Milos Forman and Ivan Passer, but her major film Daisies differed radically from theirs in almost every way. Slapstick, anarchic, and brimming with outrageous formal devices, Daisies follows the hedonistic adventures of two young girls named Marie. In highly stylized, unearthly scenes, they attack each other with scissors and cut off each other’s heads, wear butterflies instead of bikinis, and observe neither the rules of morality or reality. Daisies is filled with not-so-veiled political barbs, and Chytilova was forced to stop making films for many years after the Soviet repression during the 1970s.
Films: Daisies (1966), 74 min., color; The Ceiling (1962), 40 min., both by Vera Chytilova.