To Watch

Filip buys an eight-millimetre movie camera when his first child is born. Because it's the first camera in town, he's named official photographer by the local Party boss. His horizons widen when he is sent to regional film festivals with his first works but his focus on movie-making also leads to domestic strife and philosophical dilemmas.

A small group of adult bourgeois friends are on a day outing in the country, that outing which includes having a picnic. While they are going for a walk after the picnic, they encounter a group of officious looking men who commandeer them to a small clearing. Although there is no direct threat and the picnickers are not scared, they nonetheless feel the need to do what the men say. The men, led by one called Rudolph, set the rules of "the game". Ultimately, the picnickers learn that Rudolph was supposed to invite them to a party nearby. Much like the game, the party's host sets the rules for the party to which the picnickers and all the other guests must abide. Order in the eyes of the host seems to be paramount. Although the picnickers and the other guests enjoy many aspects of the party, some just do not want to be there, such thinking which cannot be tolerated.

In the garden of a pension, Eva and her husband Josef are enjoying a siesta. Here, they meet with the lonesome, mysterious-looking Robert. During play, a key falls out of Robert's pocket. The curious Eva picks it up and sets off on an expedition. In Robert's room, she finds a briefcase soiled with mud, which Robert had forgotten by her parsley patch before, and in it, a date-stamp. Soon afterwards, she learns that another victim of an unknown murderer of women has been found, with a number and date stamped on her forehead. Eva concludes that the murderer must be Robert.

In the aftermath of World War II, a former Czech soldier takes charge of a manor formerly owned by a German family. He falls in love with the daughter, who is now a maid, and is forced to confront the stress between his love and his conscience when he discovers her sheltering her German-soldier brother.

Set against the backdrop of a repressed Czechoslovakia, five non-related vignettes are presented, each showcasing the need and want for human connection. In "Mr. Baltazar's Death", a middle aged couple who are experts at mechanics, travel to a motorcycle race where they congregate with the masses on the section of the course where historically there has been the most action of the destructive kind. In "Imposters", two elderly hospital patients talk about their past professional glories as a journalist and light opera star respectively. Each man wants to hear about the other more than tell his own story for good reason. In "The House of Joy", two national insurance agents believe they have an easy sale when they visit an elderly goat farmer/amateur painter, who uses whatever surface as his canvass, and paints his life and his dreams. But the sale will not be as easy as the men first believe it will be. In "The Restaurant the World", a wedding reception is taking place in one part of a busy self-serve diner. The reception guests are oblivious to the sadness of real life taking place all around their small current vacuum of a world, with the bride determined to make the most of *her* night. And in "Romance", a working class lad, out on the town on his own, is mesmerized by a young Romani girl.

Witek runs after a train. Three variations follow on how such a seemingly banal incident could influence the rest of Witek's life.

One day in the life of an alcohol addict. With the help of his girlfriend Krysia, Kuba attempts to regain control of his life. But when she's at work, Kuba is home alone, and it becomes hard not to resist the temptation.

19-year-old Tomek whiles away his lonely life by spying on his opposite neighbour Magda through binoculars. She's an artist in her mid-thirties, and appears to have everything - not least a constant stream of men at her beck and call. But when the two finally meet, they discover that they have a lot more in common than appeared at first sight...

The plot couldn't be simpler or its attack on capital punishment (and the act of killing in general) more direct - a senseless, violent, almost botched murder is followed by a cold, calculated, flawlessly performed execution (both killings shown in the most graphic detail imaginable), while the murderer's idealistic young defence lawyer ends up as an unwilling accessory to the judicial murder of his client.

In the 1950's, Ludvik Jahn was expelled from the Communist Party and the University by his fellow students, because of a politically incorrect note he sent to his girlfriend. Fifteen years later, he tries to get his revenge by seducing Helena, the wife of one of his accusers.

Czech Karel Kopfrkingl enjoys his job at a crematorium in the late 1930s. He likes reading the Tibetan book of the dead, and espouses the view that cremation relieves earthly suffering. At a reception, he meets Reineke, with whom he fought for Austria in the first World War. Reineke convinces Kopfrkingl to emphasize his supposedly German heritage, including sending his timid son to the German school. Reineke then suggests that Kopfrkingl's half-Jewish wife is holding back his advancement in his job.

Tabloid life of a physicist; his work, his love life and his quest for the meaning beyond.

It's 1982: Poland is under martial law, and Solidarity is banned. Ulla, a translator working on Orwell, suddenly loses her husband, Antek, an attorney. She is possessed by her grief, and Antek continues to appear to her. She seeks to free herself in her work, in her relationship with her son, in sex, and in hypnosis. In a subplot, Ulla refers the wife of one of her husband's clients - Darek, a jailed Solidarity strike organizer - to Labrador, a world-weary, aging attorney, who works to free Darek by various political manipulations and psychological ploys.

Prague in the early 1950's. Bourgeois elements are being re-educated by working in a scrapyard full of the detritus of industrial society. The volunteer workers comprise a professor of literature, a public prosecutor, a dairyman, a saxophonist, a barber, and a young cook. Also working in the yard are a number of female prisoners serving a year for trying to defect... A camera crew arrives with potted plants and other props. An idyllic scene is created; the prisoners star briefly in a pro-North Korean newsreel before going back to work... The volunteers are striking because the scrapyard work quotas have risen without consultation. A union rep arrives to persuade them otherwise... The guard for the female prisoners gets married but the gypsy musicians make a mess at his reception. The cook flirts with one of the pretty prisoners and finally proposes...

Karol (Polish) marries Dominique (French) and moves to Paris. The marriage breaks down and Dominique divorces Karol, forcing him into the life of a metro beggar and eventually back to Poland. However, he never forgets Dominique and while building a new life for himself in Warsaw he begins to plot.

At the turn of the century, Lodz, Poland was a quick-paced manufacturing center for textiles, replete with cutthroat industrialists and unsafe working conditions. Three young friends, a Pole, a Jew and a German, pool their money together to build a factory. The movie follows their ruthless pursuit of fortune.

Tired of her husband's philandering ways, the mother of two daughters drowns her husband. With the reluctant help of the local coroner, the murder is covered up. Her daughters are having similar problems with relationships, and tend to follow their mother's example, and the coroner becomes reluctantly involved in their murders as well. As the plot progresses, visual and spoken numbers appear in the scenes, counting from one to one hundred.

Takes place in a prewar Poland. A tubercular young man comes to stay with his brother on a farm. He is in love with life and constantly plays 1930's music on a piano. He gets involved with his brother's problems and also becomes the lover of a simpleminded farm girl. The brother's dead wife may have had an affair with the hired man who is to marry the farm girl. His daughter will not confirm his suspicions. But the brother's death leads to his acceptance of the past, forgiving his wife's memory and making up with his little daughter.