Product Description

The definitive, remastered edition. With elements of horror, fairy-tale, folklore, surrealism and Freidian symbolism, Valerie and Her Week of Wonders is a surreal tale in which love, fear, sex and religion mingle into one fantastic world in the mind of an adolescent girl. This is a new digital transfer with restored picture and sound. Also included is an interview with Valerie star Jaroslava Schallerova, a booklet containing an essay on the film by Peter Hames and a new introduction/interview by film historian Michael Brooke. ''Valerie crystallizes a sense of the mystical, the ethereal and captures it to celluloid'' Diabolik DVD.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6969 in DVD
• Released on: 2008-08-25
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Full Screen, PAL
• Original language: Czech
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 73 minutes

Synopsis
This dreamlike fairytale captures the coming-of-age of a young Czechoslovakian girl. After receiving a pair of earrings, Valerie starts to experience confusing, often Freudian, dreams of fear, hope, and anticipation. As her burgeoning sexuality sparks even more haunting escapades, Valerie must contend with an explosively surreal world that challenges and inspires her. Jaromil Jires' film is surprisingly sensitive and visually spectacular.

Review
A collection of dream adventures spurred by guiltless and polysexual eroticism. Virtually every shot is a knockout. --Jonathan Rosenbaum

Review
Its overall effect is stunning. --Time Out

Customer Reviews

Beautiful nightmare
This gorgeous masterpiece from Czechoslovakia - a haunting, dream-like fable of a girls awakening to womanhood - is one of the most striking, beautiful and disturbing films i've ever seen. It's a film i've often heard about and seen referenced, but never saw - it's a shame because this movie is amazing. Like a nightmareish Grimm's fairytale with added naughtiness.
And Lubis Fiscer's perfect music is some of the most beautiful ever committed to film.

Eccentric Cult Classic
Eccentric Cult Classic
I suppose “Valerie” (1970) was a belated product of the Czech New Wave but it comes after the Prague Spring / Russian invasion. It was probably too surreal for the commissars & censors to bother with. In the West it became a cult favourite in the days when people smoked illicit substances at late night screenings in indie cinemas.
Valerie is the young heroine, she has her first period but fortunately she’s got these magic ear-rings, however everyone in her rustic village seems to be lusting with nature or turning into vampires. I hope that makes the plot clear. It must be something to do with that favourite 60s theme: “a young girl’s sexual awakening.” It’s quite effective in conjuring a sense of anxious adolescent reverie in which everything familiar becomes erotic or strange or both at the same time.
The film is structured by extreme montage, which is all over the place & makes Nic Roeg look moderate. It’s beautifully shot and extremely picturesque. This DVD transfer is from a scratchy print but maybe that adds to the charm / ambience. The DVD is put out by a company “Redemption” specializing in “gothic erotic horror.” No extras other than trailers for other “Redemption” films, judging by which they seem to be aiming at a Marilyn Manson market. I can’t imagine either goths or S/M types (or horror fans) finding much of interest in “Valerie”. However the excellent pop band Broadcast did base their “Ha Ha Sound” album around this film, so it clearly does appeal to some contemporary cult music/film fans.

Czech it out!
This film makes sense in a very strange kind of a way - a bit like a dream does. It isn't very intelligible as a story, but it seems to suck you in nonetheless, the repetitive themes in the music evidently keyed to moods and characters so much so that I would label it a musical. The rhythm of the Czech language also adds to the mysteriousness and "music" of the characters. As far as I can tell Valerie is trying to find her (dead?) mother, assisted by her pasty Babicka (grandmother) and boyfriend (?) Orlik, or Eagle. Her tribulations involve arraignment as a witch and near death at the stake, and the film, although made under an atheist communist regime cracking down on the avant-garde after the events of the 1968 "Prague Spring", is pregnant with religious - or anti-religious? - imagery.

Not one for fans of straightforward action or stories, but a wonderful way of relaxing and being sucked into ones own dreams for an hour or two. Essential also for expressionist artists trying to create a new painting, as I was definitely influenced in my own work by watching this film.