Špína ([Filth], 2017, Teresa Nvotová)

 Teresa Nvotová made several documentaries before she presented her first feature Filth. Her take of the drama unfolding in less than 90 minutes is also observing, without judging and empathy. The characters reveal themselves.

The film starts with a electroshock therapy. The next 50 minutes or so tell us, how 17-year-old Lena got there. At the beginning of the flash back Lena is an ordinary girl. Once in a while she skips classes and talks with her Róza about sex and how it feels to have an erected sticky penis in hand. They adore their math teacher Robo. Robo also looks after Lena's physically challenged brother and gives Lena extra lessons in her home. Things go wrong from here, when Robo gets physical and rapes Lena. He leaves her with the trauma. Next she is trying to commit suicide and then we meet her in a psychiatric ward. Things run fast, as Nvotová at this point is not very much interested in Lena's development. Most of the film deals with the scandalously bad state of the health system in  Slovakia. 

The psychiatric hospital is close to criminal neglect,the doctor in charge seems worse than nurse Ratched. What they therapy makes things worse. Lena's co-patient Iva was raped by her father, but the doctor doubts her story. Iva and Lena joke about different ways to commit suicide. When the doctor finally releases Iva, it is no longer a joke. She takes her life. 

Although Lena's mother has doubts, she believes the doctor that am electric shock would benefit Lena. We finally concentrate on Lena's story. Her mother insists that she is discharged. She returns back to some kind of normality. Scumbag Robo is forced to confess his crime, but will he have to pay for it. At the end Lena rejects a  boy, but we don't know if she does so because she now is an independent woman or because the scars on her soul prevent her from the commitments of a relationship.

Filth doesn't really know what it wants. The life in the psychiatric hospital are told in some detail. Nvotová uses real in-mates from psychiatric hospitals who play versions of themselves and real actors. Those scenes are directed very skillfully. The story of Lena is told in a rather sloppy way, more like "Last Time on Filthy" than showing the development, the inner conflicts and the final resolution. Now it is more like a two in one film.

6/10 

Učiteľka (2016, Jan Hřebejk)

This is an astonishing film. Originally it was conceived for, but captures fast our imagination. The TV only, but because of its outstanding qualities it was shown at the Film Festival of Karlovy Vary, harvested prizes and has received a much wider scope than intended originally.
The teacher recreates very subtly the atmosphere in Slovakia  in the end of the Communist Reign. You can have a good live, if you abide by the their rules. Rule #1: Don't attract attention. Rule #2: Don't disagree with the official opinion. If you are consenting with them, you might have a good life. Maybe you will have somebody with some kind of influence around. But maybe you will also encounter somebody who likes misuse that influence for personal benefit.
The teacher in this movie is such a person. When she gets a new class, she makes meticulous notes about the professions of her new pupils. She employs her children to clean her apartment and used their parents to do her favours, like obtaining rare medicine, giving free taxa rides, doing the shopping or repairing her washing machine. You don't want to do that? Well, your kids will pay the price. Their marks will fall quickly. Those in power can destroy your career, your life.
The Teacher starts somewhat slow, but captures fast our imagination. It shows in a clever way, how the system always finds something to put possible criticism to silence. There is a fine balance between the teacher and how those who are victims of the her caprices react.
On a broader scale this is, however, not only a story about misuse of power in communism. With some adaptations this could bhave happened anywhere.
In a Q&A Zuzana Mauréry, the main actor, said that this film from Slovakia did not fare very well in the Czech Republic. There was no explanation why it was not so successful with Czechs.
8/10

Out (2017, György Kristóf)

Even in its home country this is not known as Vychladnutie, but under the English title. It is a bit sad, that everything needs to have an English title, if it wants to be something. So is this something?
We are in the Hungarian-speaking community of Slovakia. Agoston is a 50+ man who is fired from his job for the sake of reconstruction of economy and blabla - see any argument by any neo-liberal. He finds a job offer from a company in Latvia and is hired fro that job. However, bribes obviously  are are strong force in that society, so he gets a job in a shipbuilding factory. Quickly he becomes unpopular with the foreman. So Agoston leaves that work. Fishing is his passion. He buys the necessary equipment and seems to hope that he will be able to make a living from selling fish.
In Latvia he meets strange people - like Gaida who collects grass for dead rabbits. There is also the wife of a Russian friend, who looks like a plastic doll, who still is very much in favor of a natural life style. At last he makes his dream come true, altough not as he had hoped. All this is somewhat amusing, even entertaining, but ultimately pointless and irrelevant.
5/10