Gettin' Medieval on Your Ass!

Along with Tarkovsky's Andrei Rublev, Markéta Lazarová is arguably the greatest film ever made about medieval times. Is there any real competition? Shadows of Our Forgotten Ancestors by Sergei Paradjanov, perhaps? I suppose Bergman's work, specifically The Virgin Spring or The Seventh Seal, might get the war drums pounding at my statement. Undoubtedly, Orson Welles created one of the genre's finest battle scenes in Chimes at Midnight, a terrific picture indeed. Then we have Dreyer's The Passion of Joan of Arc, a bona fide masterpiece, but its 15th century world is enclosed by churches, courtrooms, and torture chambers. Markéta Lazarová, on the other hand, runs as wild and free as the black wolves it depicts in stark contrast to the pure, white snowscape.

It may not rank among the most prolific nations in filmmaking, but a number of classics were born in Czechoslovakia/Czech Republic. Miloš Forman, the director of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Amadeus, is a Czech export who gained international recognition after making Loves of a Blonde and The Fireman's Ball in his native land. Other wonderful Czech films include The Shop on Main Street, Closely Watched Trains, Kolya, etc. Released in 1967, Markéta Lazarová may be the best of the lot, and was actually named the greatest by a group of Czech critics in 1998.

The story, based on a 1931 novel by Vladislav Vančura, concerns the Kozliks and Lazars, two rival 13th-century clans. Mikoláš Kozlik (Frantisek Velecký) and his one-armed brother, Adam, attack a group of men along the road, one of whom happens to be the son of a Count. This angers the king, who sends his top man, Captain Beer (Zdenek Kryzánek), to take care of the situation. Mikoláš tries to convince the Lazars to join in the conflict, but gets beaten to a pulp by them instead. The only bright light in all this is young Markéta (Magda Vásáryová), Lazar's daughter, a virgin who will soon become a nun. Knowing of her unspoiled innocence and her father's plans for her future, Mikoláš exacts revenge by kidnapping her.

Unlike Braveheart, where the Middle Ages are populated by beautiful people who appear to bathe twice a day, brush their teeth after each meal, receive their wardrobe each morning from the prop department, and make love beneath a moonlit sky as James Horner's score plays in the background; Markéta Lazarová is more concerned with reality. These people are plain and dirty. Their daily quest for survival transcends any thought of vanity. They act more like beasts than men. In fact, one of the clans in the movie superstitiously believes a legend that they descend from a line of werewolves.

Living conditions are awful, even for the nobles. Bandits murder hapless travelers while opportunists lie in wait to loot the fresh corpses left behind. There are incestuous relationships, more common in those days than Hollywood would have us believe. A young virgin woman is promised to the church, but after she is raped by a pagan, her own father and the local nuns reject her. As a prisoner, survival instinct compels her to fall in love with her own rapist; the alpha male and the only thing protecting her from getting raped by everyone else.

In case I have not been clear, a romantic vision of lords and their ladies fair this is not; more like dog eat dog and survival of the fittest. There is a very convincing depiction of the world of paganism on the one side, and Christianity on the other; both being seen as equally hypocritical and corrupt thanks to the ever present vices of mankind (greed, lust, thirst for power, you name it and it's probably here).

All of this was researched so thoroughly and captured with such authenticity that, like Kurosawa's Seven Samurai, it feels as though a movie crew traveled through time and rolled their cameras as these events transpired. There are no big stars. No Australian (Russell Crowe), playing an ancient Roman, while speaking English. No concessions whatsoever to Hollywood storytelling, heroes and villains, plot twists, or gratuitous spectacle.

The director, František Vláčil, spent years on this project and exercised a Kurosawa-esque obsession with detail. On the set of Throne of Blood in 1956, Kurosawa had an entire 16th-century fortress set torn down and rebuilt when he discovered the carpenters used steel nails in its construction. Even in the front row of the theater no one would have seen the nails, but Kurosawa could not stomach such inaccuracy.

For Markéta Lazarová, Vláčil insisted the costumes and sets be created in the same manner, with the same available materials, as they would have in the 13th-century. For a couple years, he made his actors live as hunter-gatherers in the woods to better understand the lifestyle. Even the language was stripped down to its primitive roots, and the composer of the wonderful score, Zdeněk Liška, fashioned several of his instruments from materials discovered in the wild. This passionate devotion is expertly captured through Bedřich Batka's brilliant Cinemascope images and Miroslav Hájek's sure-handed editing.

Perhaps best of all, Markéta Lazarová is one of those rare historical films that smartly refuses to view the past through a filter of modern morality. Vláčil does not pass judgment on these characters, he simply lets them exist. We have the benefit of hindsight when it comes to the wrongs of slavery, for example, but if we lived when it was common practice ninety percent of us would have nothing to say about it. This movie does not impose current attitudes on the lifestyles of 13th-century people; to do so may be politically correct by our standards, but it would also be complete bullshit.

I should probably admit that the first time I watched Markéta Lazarová in 2007 I found it nearly incomprehensible, due to the way the narrative jumps around, but the second time everything clicked. Plenty of movies reward multiple viewings, but here it is practically required. If you plan to watch this film just once, I recommend you do not even bother. If Pauline Kael were still alive, I would be frustrated to no end by her stubborn refusal to watch any film twice. If she ever saw Markéta Lazarová, she probably didn't like it. I was wrongly convinced, four years ago, that I didn't either.