Sedmikrasky- “a necrologue about a negative way of life”
I first saw this film when I was about 13 and it's hard to put into words how big of an impact it had on a young girl just entering adolescence. It was only then that I began to see more and more often that the world in which I live is not built for me and does not belong to me, therefore the story of two young women who take advantage of its corruption for their own benefit and fall into a spiral of hedonistic madness appealed to me so much. I was and still am infatuated with girls' disobedience to a world led by men. Me and my best friend at the time wanted to base our entire personalities on the main characters.
The main characters, Marie I and Marie II were everything I wanted to be, I wanted to be as brave as they are and not to take into account what others think about me, despite the fact that I see the cruelty and decay of this world, as an individual, I am not able to with it fight or fix it, so why can't I use my short stay on earth for my own pure pleasure?
“Sedmikrasky (eng. Daisies)” was directed by the one-of-a-kind Czech avant-garde filmmaker Věra Chytilová and is considered one of the most important films from the Czechoslovak New Wave. It was filmed two years before the Prague Spring, or more precisely in 1966. It was highly criticized by the right-wing. The authorities found it harmful to their ideas, which resulted in it being banned from theaters or export in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, and the director herself was banned from working until 1975. This movie is full of consumerism and a negative attitude towards the authoritarian system, the girls did not provide a moral example, they refused to play the roles that society required of them. Chytilova herself described it as "a farce on parasitism", it is also seen as a satire of the decadence of the bourgeoisie. the film was also, a counterattack to the Stalinist regime.
Chytilova collaborated on screenplay with Ester Krumbachova, who was a screenwriter, costume designer, stage designer, author and director, and has worked in productions such as 1970's “Valerie and Her Week of Wonders”.
The movie begins with a montage showing the movement of machines and bombs falling to the ground causing explosions, in the background we can hear rhythmic music that sounds a bit like a march.
Then we meet the two main characters Marie I and Marie II, which are a reflection of Anne I and Anne II of the “Seven Deadly Sins” by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht. Young girls move like robots or dolls and are accompanied by creaking sounds. Chytilova ridicules the absurd demands on women in the male dominated society, and with this action she emphasizes how silly is the patriarchal ideal of femininity, which does not exist, but is only a performance. The way girls behave indicates the infantilization of women by society. However, Marie I and Marie II will later use this infantilization for their own benefit.
The girls sit on the beach, Marie II puts a wreath of daisies on her head, these flowers are a symbol of purity and innocence, and the wreath of flowers in Slavic culture was supposed to symbolize virginity. Another frequently recurring symbol is green apples (the apple of temptation). Marie I blows a trumpet. The girls find the world spoiled, so why can't they be spoiled as well? Suddenly they find themselves in a clearing in the middle of which there is a tree with forbidden fruit. Marie II takes a peach from it. Then the girls are in their room, Maria II spits the pit from her mouth.
The first of the girls' “pranks” is a date in a restaurant with an older man whom they use to satisfy their gluttony and then leave him at a train station. The man is so blinded by their affection towards him that he is unaware of their obvious pretending and playing with him. They are not like real humans, they are more like images, which also highlights how women are perceived in society. What is the point of my existence if not to be looked at?
Wherever they go, they wreak havoc. They make a fuss in the bar, they use men more and more often, they play with them, men are practically only a source of food and entertainment for them, and their telephone numbers are written on the walls of their flat, which also changes beyond recognition with the unfolding action of the film.
One of the scenes that touched me a lot was when a woman working in a restaurant that girls go to tells them in the toilet that they don't have time for her anymore, to which the Maries reply that they are in a hurry not even looking at the woman, only correcting their makeup in the mirror, the woman looks at them kindly and sings "youth, why do you run away so quickly, why, as I recall you, an eye tears" but they ignore it rejecting the fact that one day they will have to grow old as well.
One of the most common sins they commit is gluttony. In one of the scenes they are lying on their bed, their apartment looks like a tornado passed through it, in the background you can hear the voice of a man who professes Marie II love from the telephone receiver. The girls treat these confessions like a background noise, a radio broadcast and are too busy feasting.
They jump out of a moving train, steal money, but the truth is that they are still missing something and are not entirely happy, but they try not to think about it. Marie II turns on the gas in their apartment at one point, but is saved by the fact that she forgot to close the window. They think a lot about their existence and feel misunderstood and isolated from the rest of the world.
“-Do you feel it?
-What?
-How quickly the life passes”
Finally, they go to the countryside with the intention of spreading their chaos on a larger scale, but nobody pays attention to them there, they want desperately to be noticed. Eventually they find a banquet hall overflowing with food, and they immediately start eating and drinking, they have a food fight as well. They break plates and glasses and finally climb onto the huge crystal chandelier then begin to swing on it.
Suddenly they fall from the chandelier right into the lake and start to drown, but no one wants to help them, they shout that they don't want to be spoiled anymore.
Then chytilova shows viewers what their attempt to fix everything might look like. They break into the banquet hall again and try to clean up the mess they made. But what is broken cannot be saved. They try to fix the shattered plates and clean all the food. When cleaning they whisper: “we will polish it and clean it and we will be so happy”,” because we are polite, happy and hardworking”, “thanks to our work we are both so happy”. Eventually they lay down on the table after their hard work and say:
-We are both so happy. Say that we are happy
-Are we pretending this?
-No. We are really happy
-But it is not a problem
Then the crystal chandelier falls on them and the scene cuts to a war footage.
Vera Chytilova dedicates this film “to those who fall ill over a trampled salad”.
The Maries themselves would certainly not describe themselves as feminists, but their anarchist approach to a system that is unfair to them may be considered feminism. Many people say that this film focuses on criticizing the actions of these young girls, but I believe that it is a criticism of the world that surrounds them, and the very presentation of women and their rebelliousnes in chytilova's film is really modern.
Both Maries use their inferior position in society and their hyper-femininity for their own purposes, It is their way of finding themselves and surviving in a world that doesn't make any sense.
The Czechoslovak New Wave is divided into two types: symbolic/allegorical, such as Vera Chytilova's films, and realistic films, such as those of Milosa Forman, but they are united by the observation of man and the analysis of his nature, as well as a deeper analysis of humanity and reality.
“Sedmikrasky” is edited to look like a collage. From seemingly incoherent shots, a fragmented plot with elements of a morality play emerges. The film is sometimes black and white, and at other times it flashes in different colors, lots of jump cuts and discontinuity. The editing of the film is as rebellious as the main characters are. It resembles images that can be seen in dreams.
