The Firemen's ball = Hori, ma paneko

Milos Forman’s third feature film, and the last one he directed in his native Czechoslovakia before fleeing the Soviet tanks of 1968, is a delightful black comedy about bureaucratic ineptitude and rural insularity. It is the night of the annual Fireman’s Ball and the firefighters have gathered to select the Queen of the Ball who will present a special gift of honour to their loyal, dying President. Unfortunately, none of the young women selected as contestants are happy about the honour, someone is stealing the raffle prizes and the night culminates in a disastrous fire. One of the leading directors of the Czech New Wave, “The Firemen’s ball” on its release was greeted as a biting commentary on Socialist bureaucracy and political culture. A year after its release, the promise of the Prague Spring was extinguished by the Soviet occupation, and the absurdity of the firemen - given the subsequent transformation of Eastern European society - now strikes a contemporary viewer as innocent and benign. The comedy now seems delightful and endearing rather than biting and confronting. In its tender, comic depiction of rural life and mores, “The Firemen’s ball” is almost an East European cousin to Ealing. In Czech with English subtitles.