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After watching 7 Czech Sci-Fi flicks I decided that it was time to start looking at a new area of Czech cinema. Checking movies that a DVD seller, (who is a big Czech film fan) had tracked down,I remembered him praising what might be the only Czech Western ever made!,which led to me having a glass of lemonade with Joe.
The plot:
1885:
Disguised at how drunk everyone is in the salons, evangelists Ezra Goodman and his daughter Winnifred decide to go round the salons and get the cowboys off hard drinks for their own, non-alcoholic drink Kolaloka. Initially taking no notice,the cowboys quickly change their mind when legendary cowboy Lemonade Joe rides into town a praises the drink.Fearing that his bars are about to go bust,owner Doug Badman brings his brother Horace (aka: "Hogofogo, the Master Criminal of the Wild West") in,to give Joe his last drop of lemonade.
View on the film:
Pulling the most American genre over the Iron Curtain,co- writer/(along with Jirí Brdecka)director Oldrich Lipský crossfires surreal cowboy shootouts with a glance towards the early beginnings of the genre.Filling the barrooms with Vlastimil Hála & Jan Rychlík's piano-led score, Lipský and cinematographer Vladimír Novotný spill stylish blue,red and lemon tints over the movie,which along with wrapping the title in an elegant Silent Movie appearance,are joined by film speed manipulation,that give the title a unique,quirky atmosphere.
Working in the "traditional" clichés of the genre, Lipský and Jirí Brdecka's adaptation of Brdecka's shoots pointed satirical darts at US capitalism and Soviet Union communism.Stuffing the bars full of their own brand of Coca Cola/ Kolaloka,the writers wonderfully paint Joe as a good kid determined to spread a capitalism product across the west.Keeping a black and white minstrel in line to "play his part",the writers brilliantly open the characters strongly held ideas over tradition,as a sly card game to play the Soviet Union's ridged belief over "what part" people must play against the wild west.Entering what was to become the biggest hit at the 60's Czech box office, Karel Fiala gives Czech's their own lemon drop kid,by blending a heroic sense of adventure in Joe with a dashing animated smile,as Lemonade Joe pours himself some lemonade.
score 9/10
morrison-dylan-fan 8 April 2016
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw3447560/ |
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14-3-2021 00:06:14