FLOWER BUDS

A village in Bohemia in the weeks before Christmas. A thin layer of snow covers the countryside where Jarda and his family live. The railway signal repairman likes making ships out of matchsticks to put inside bottles. Unfortunately, he’s also addicted to the fruit machines in the village pub, meaning he’s now up to his ears in debt. His wife Kamila, blissfully unaware of Jarda’s problem, cleans the station toilets day for day. She dreams of getting up on stage with her girlfriends to wow the audience with a song called “Flower Buds”. Their two children have secrets of their own: young Honza is growing marijuana with a friend and has fallen in love with a stripper who’s somewhat puzzled by the teenager’s attentions. Agata, the couple’s daughter, is pregnant, but so far nobody but her best friend knows. As the feast of love draws closer, the family’s problems seem to grow more insurmountable by the day. Casual in tone, yet poetic all the same, this unusual tale of Christmas in the provinces won many awards for director Zdeněk Jiráský, who tells us about the secrets life conceals somewhere between the drab everyday and dreams of a better future.