Shut Up and Shoot Me

It must be said that this is a picture with a miserable screenplay that is barely good enough for an hour-long tale. It also has a needlessly dragged-out introduction and the relatively average Andy Nyman. Luckily, otherwise there are just positives. We get perfectly functional (and appropriate) black humor, a few scenes and snappy lines that stick in your head (most of the deaths, for instance). It considerably helps the picture that it was written and filmed by a Brit, while taking place in Prague, so it has that “outside view" of us, which makes for some funny situations. However, the greatest ace that it has up its sleeve is the absolutely excellent Karel Roden. He carries the whole movie on his shoulders, even during some of the weaker scenes. Considering it cost a mere three million crowns (somewhere around 150,000 dollars), it looks pretty good in technical terms and you can see that you can make a movie even with a minimum of funds. Objectively this is a only slightly above-average picture, on the other hand I was in the right mood and happened to like it more than lots of other movies I have seen recently, so I am absolutely content. However, I can’t shake the feeling that with a better screenplay it would have been on the way to being more than “just" a very good black comedy. (10/12/2005)

If this was made in the USA, it would be a tailor-made independent film. In the Czech Republic, the existence of professional studios with proper support is absent in film production, meaning that it is only a higher category of amateurism. This is how I would imagine a collective graduation project by film school students if they found a decent sponsor. The low budget is not the problem, as the shortcomings primarily lie in the script and are so prominent that they cannot be overlooked despite the indisputable inventiveness and humor of certain scenes. The involvement of Karel Roden is a good thing, who, unrestrained by the demands of big productions, acts with great enthusiasm and clearly enjoys many of the scenes. On the other hand, Andy Nyman essentially manages the entire runtime with a single naive expression on his face, and Aňa Geislerová shows how limited her acting range is. Overall impression: 45%. (15/02/2013)