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CZECH DREAM
Produced & Directed by: Vit Klusak & Filip Remunda.
Director of Photography: Klusak.
Edited by: Zdenek Marek.
Music by: Hynek Schneider.
Released by: SchwazSmith & Taskovski Films.
Language: Czech with English subtitles.
Country of Origin: Czech Republic. 87 min. Not Rated.

In the introduction to Czech Dream, two young filmmakers spell out their plan to lure gullible consumers to a brand-new supermarket (called hypermarket here) symbolically named Czech Dream – think Whole Foods on the cheap – that doesn’t in fact exist. To what effect the directors don’t provide any answers, but their film does – to a point.

The duo stretch the premise for all its worth. Not unlike a heist film, the most entertaining and informative moments play out during the set-up of the con, aided by a world-renowned ad agency. The directors, Vit Klusak and Filip Remunda, exchange their loose T-shirts and jeans for Hugo Boss suits to convincingly portray clean-cut managers – not only do they have a gimmick, they also have the right look. The resulting ad campaign would grab attention in any media-saturated market, with slogans such as “Don’t Come” or “Don’t Rush,” and flyers spreading the word of the too-good-to-be-true low prices.

For the radio, Remunda and Klusak supervise the making of a commercial jingle, a schmaltzy radio ballad with a Celine Dion-like wailer beckoning “If you have no cash, get a loan and scream I want my dream” along with an angelic 50-member children’s choir. The obviously crass lyrics perhaps best reveal the filmmakers’ attitude toward those who would fall for the meticulously orchestrated promotional campaign.

Tellingly, a riff breaks out between the filmmakers and their advertising team as they split hairs over what is a lie or just manipulation. A hipster exec in a camouflage T-shirt and baseball cap adamantly declares he doesn’t lie in advertising, conveniently ignoring that the entire project is a hoax. Here and elsewhere, the low-key and deadpan directors, who have no camera presence, are upstaged by their surroundings, successively deflecting the focus off of them.

Climactically, the truth is revealed at the store’s grand opening on a grassy Prague field. The reactions from the thousands of mostly working- and middle-class would-be shoppers range all over the spectrum, proving that advertising manipulates, people want things cheaply – and the earth still turns.

However, the directors don’t let themselves off the hook. Not only are they a frequent target of anger, but any smug sense of satisfaction for the project’s success is undercut by the sight of an obese woman on crutches navigating her way through the field to the façade of the storefront. Expect to squirm. (Consumer instincts may be universal but some symbols are not. To mark the celebration, the arrivals receive rainbow flags that wouldn’t be out of place in any American Gay Pride parade.) Kent Turner
June 15, 2007