Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (1970)
Czech cinema had a remarkable and tragically brief flowering in the 1960s and early 1970s. The movement now known as the Czechoslovak New Wave produced a string of films that pushed hard against the constraints of state-sanctioned socialist realism, using allegory, surrealism, and a loose, improvisatory energy to say things that could not easily be said directly. Directors like Miloš Forman and Věra Chytilová became internationally celebrated figures from this era. Chytilová's Daisies (1966) and The Firemen's Ball (1967) by Forman are perhaps the most widely seen examples of that restless, rule-breaking spirit. It was into this creative moment that Jaromil Jireš released Valerie and Her Week of Wonders, adapting a 1935 surrealist novella by the Czech poet Vítězslav Nezval. The source material was itself a product of the European surrealist tradition, mixing fairy-tale imagery with erotic and gothic undercurrents, and it had sat largely untouched for decades before Jireš brought it to the screen. The film arrived in 1970, just as Soviet-led normalisation was beginning to reassert control over Czechoslovak cultural life, which lends it a certain historical weight as one of the last gasps of that more open, experimental era.
Jireš, who had already made his name with the 1968 drama The Joke, approached Nezval's material as something close to a waking dream. Produced at the Barrandov Studios in Prague, the film runs to a spare 73 minutes and leans hard into a visual grammar of folk imagery, religious iconography, and fairy-tale archetypes. The plot, such as it is, follows Valerie, a young girl on the cusp of adolescence, whose pair of magic earrings seem to unlock a world of vampires, carnival visitors, and morally compromised authority figures clustered around her grandmother's provincial home. The cinematography by František Vláčil regular Jan Čuřík is lush and meticulously composed, and the film's reputation in certain critical circles rests very heavily on that visual quality. The score by Luboš Fišer has also attracted considerable admiration over the years. In the title role, Jaroslava Schallerová was just thirteen at the time of filming, a casting decision that sits at the centre of most serious discussions about the picture's ethics and intent. The supporting cast, including Helena Anýžová as the grandmother and Jiří Prýmek as the vampire-like Gracian, bring a theatrical, almost expressionistic quality to their performances that fits the material's dream logic, for better or worse.
The film has accumulated a devoted following over the decades, particularly in art-house and cult cinema circles, where it is often discussed alongside other visually ambitious and politically coded fantasies of the period. Comparisons with Fantastic Planet (1973) are not uncommon, given both films use the conventions of fantasy to carry allegorical freight about power, control, and the body. Whether Valerie actually delivers on the promise of that framing is, needless to say, a matter of some debate, and Macca has his own views on where the film stands.
I wish I’d been properly warned before sitting down to watch Jaromil Jireš’s 1970 Czechoslovakian picture Valerie and Her Week of Wonders.
It is frequently billed as a whimsical, avant-garde surrealistic horror film about the trials of puberty. While that might be the standard academic pitch, the reality is a deeply troubling experience that makes it incredibly tough to offer any sort of positive recommendation.
On a purely technical level, the film has undeniable artistic merit. The vibrant Technicolor cinematography gives it a surreal, dreamlike aesthetic that is genuinely striking to look at, and the accompanying musical score is undeniably beautiful. In those respects it reminded me of Colour of Pomegranate. The horror elements, featuring vampires and shadowy figures, are clearly intended as a social commentary on the patriarchal forces trying to control the new generation. Fair play to the make-up department, too, as the practical effects are really good and add to the gothic fairy-tale vibe surrounding young Valerie, played by Jaroslava Schallerová.
However, all that artistic polish cannot mask the fact that the movie is, quite frankly, a bit of devoid when it comes to its moral compass. The area where this film completely falls apart is its inclusion of attempted incest, gratuitous child nudity, and other deeply abhorrent themes. Watching these scenes play out isn't edgy or provocative; it’s just deeply uncomfortable and entirely unjustifiable. It strips away any lingering goodwill the beautiful visuals might have built, leaving you feeling profoundly uneasy rather than intellectually stimulated.
This is a picture that desperately needs a massive content warning, one that is rarely attached to its modern screenings. Jireš may have been trying to craft a subversive critique of societal norms, but the execution crosses a line that makes it impossible to stomach. It’s a visually arresting but morally bankrupt exercise that I simply cannot recommend to anyone.
The conversation around Valerie and Her Week of Wonders is unlikely to quieten any time soon. It occupies a genuinely awkward position in cinema history: a film that arrived at a culturally significant moment, carries clear artistic ambition, and yet asks its audience to absorb material that many will find indefensible regardless of the critical framework placed around it. Whether the New Wave context or the surrealist lineage of the source novella are sufficient reasons to revisit it is a question each viewer will have to answer for themselves, though it is worth being clear-eyed about what that viewing actually involves before you commit. Some films reward the effort of sitting with their discomfort. Some are simply uncomfortable.
Rating: ★½ | Year: 1970 | Watched: 2026-07-27
Trailer
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