Audition / Talent Competition (Konkurs) (1964)
A Film by Milos Forman
DVD5 | ISO+MDS | PAL 4:3 (720x576) | 01:19:06 | 3,69 Gb
Audio: Czech AC3 2.0 @ 192 Kbps | Subtitles: English
Genre: Documentary, Drama, Music | Czechoslovakia
A Film by Milos Forman
DVD5 | ISO+MDS | PAL 4:3 (720x576) | 01:19:06 | 3,69 Gb
Audio: Czech AC3 2.0 @ 192 Kbps | Subtitles: English
Genre: Documentary, Drama, Music | Czechoslovakia
KONKURS is Milos Forman's debut film and launched what became known internationally as the Czech New Wave. Although made as two separate 'featurettes', the style and themes were very similar and they were released as one film. KONKURS is important as the first work of a world-renowned director because it clearly shows the beginnings of the style and pre-occupations prominent in many of Forman's subsequently acclaimed films including 'Loves of a Blonde', 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' and 'Amadeus'.
IMDB
Second Run DVD
Also Known As: Talent Competition
Originally conceived and produced as two separate short films, Forman’s (sort-of) feature debut – comprising of beautifully observed documentary footage of musicians and singers of various ages rehearsing (in the first part) and auditioning (in the second part), with some additional scripted interludes – is a fascinating and strangely moving minor-work from the great Czech director.Iain Stott
Though they’re a mostly small scale outfit, Second Run have to date specialised primarily in heavyweight films dealing with heavyweight subjects. The Ear was banned in its home country for many years on political grounds. Nighthawks effectively brought homosexuality in all its ordinariness to British cinema screens. And Portrait of Jason offered a voice to an increasingly drunken gay hustler. It looks as though Audition/Talent Competition is going to be more of the same. It was the film which kickstarted the Czech New Wave. It provided debuts for director Milos Forman (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, The People Versus Larry Flynt), future director Ivan Passer (Cutter’s Way) and cinematographer Miroslav Ondricek (who would continue relations with both). It also comes from a country notable for making cinema as political allegory. And its editing methods share an affinity with the avant-garde.
Yet Audition isn’t some great monolith to contend with, but a bright and especially breezy venture. A blend of documentary and drama, it’s marked by a wonderful gentility in both its observation and its humour. Indeed, this isn’t a film which imposes itself on an audience, but rather slowly invites us in. And more importantly, we want to be there such is its warmth; it’s exactly the kind of film which you’d imagine getting reacquainted with on regular occasions as a means of revisiting its upbeat mood.
Trying to describe Audition beyond its mood, however, is slightly more difficult, not least because it is in fact two shorts welded together. The first, running at approximately 33 minutes, combines footage of a pair of orchestras rehearsing with shots of various youths on motorcycles. Initially you could be forgiven that this was some kind of strange precursor to Kenneth Anger’s Scorpio Rising (made the following year). Replacing the US director’s classic rock ‘n’ roll is the music of a tradition Czech brass band, whilst the assembled youth seem far more innocent than Anger’s. Yet the editing rhythms are the same the effect surprisingly similar – the only real difference is that whereas the later short took on certain homoerotic signifiers, Forman’s is altogether more naïve and charming.
Interestingly, this could be seen as a reflection of the director himself. Audition achieves its drama not so much by the events onscreen, but through the fact that it sees Forman trying to find his style. The focus on more youthful protagonists would appear to be a means of borrowing their energy, whilst the present of the traditional folk music seems to represent an older order. As such we find Forman in between the two, respecting the latter (the music does sound great and comes without comment, ironic or otherwise) but really connecting with the former; he find the inherent recklessness of the motorcyclist (see The Wild One, Alice’s Restaurant, countless Hell’s Angels movies) utterly fascinating. Indeed, Audition shouldn’t be read as a political allegory – as is often the case with Czech cinema – but a personal one. It represents Forman trying to find his own place as a filmmaker – one in between tradition and newer, younger forces – and inadvertently perhaps creating the new wave. Look at many of the country’s films which followed in its wake – Forman’s next feature Peter and Pavna, Jiri Menzel’s Closely Observed Trains, Daisies, Valerie and Her Week of Wonders - and similar tensions appear.
I use the word inadvertently as I’m not sure as to exactly how much of Audition was pre-planned. Being mostly vérité-style documentary footage it doesn’t feel like a construct. You get the impression that Forman has shaped it all at a later date; testing out editing rhythms, fleshing out juxtapositions and seeing what could be made of them. Interestingly, the result is more akin to the UK’s ‘Free Cinema’ than it is the French nouvelle vague - Tony Richardson’s Momma Don’t Allow, in particular, whilst director of photography Ondricek would go on to work with Lindsay Anderson on a number of occasions, most notably If…., another youth driven picture. Moreover, the authenticity would appear to be integral: part two opens with a hectic title sequence, but also a disclaimer noting the film stock (black and white 16mm) and the use of “authentic locations”.
This second part, running at approximately 46 minutes, could be seen as a progression of the first given that it shares a number of concerns. Gone are the brass bands and therefore the adult dimension. Instead, the film is predominantly occupied by groups of teenagers as it documents the talent competition of its title. Of course this means that the soundtrack also changes, replacing the traditional folk music with early sixties Czechoslovakian pop which alternately sounds like primitive rock ‘n’ roll, some long-forgotten (best forgotten?) Eurovision entry, one of the excerpt from Russian musical documentary East Side Story and the kind of thing David Bowie might have considered covering on his Pin Ups album (plenty of saxophone).
As such we arrive at a more youthful picture of Czechoslovakia as well as a more dated one. The song lyrics are often trite in their naïveté (“Come on twist and rock ‘n’ roll/Put on your jeans”) and the hairstyles are long gone, but then this only adds to the charm. As with part one there are dramatic interpolations slotted into the overall documentary mood, yet it’s the vérité which holds sway; remove Forman and his concerns and we still arrive a fascinating record of the time.
Yet Forman is present and we are therefore tempted to look beyond the reportage and find connections with his later work. Following on from Audition he continued to make features in Czechoslovakia – amongst them such key works as A Blonde in Love and The Fireman’s Ball - before decamping to the US. His first feature there was a collaboration with Jean-Claude Carrière which offers one particularly interesting comparison point. Entitled Taking Off, it takes an askew look at the America of the time, particularly its then current (this being 1970) counter-culture. In order to get under the skin of this alien milieu he contrasted the main dramatic strand – the one involving the adults – which documentary-style footage of a talent competition. The connection is, of course, obvious as is the motivation: whenever Forman comes across new territory he simply sits back and observes with a certain amusement. Arguably, it made Taking Off his finest achievement, though that’s not to say that Audition doesn’t exert a similar fascination.
Features include:
# Digitally re-mastered with restored image and sound
# New and improved English subtitle translation.
Many Thanks to dang.