Údolí včel (The Valley of the Bees). 1968. Czechoslovakia. Directed by František Vláčil. Screenplay by Vláčil, Vladimir Körner. With Petr Čepek, Jan Kačer, Zdeněk Kryzánek, Věra Galatíková, Miroslav Macháček. International restoration premiere. DCP. In Czech; English subtitles. 101 min.
A fascinating medieval allegory of religious fanaticism, rebellion, and freedom that was inspired by (and perhaps even equal to) Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal and The Virgin Spring, The Valley of the Bees was director František Vláčil and screenwriter Vladimír Körner’s follow-up to their epic Marketa Lazarová, until that point the most expensive Czech film ever made and later voted the nation’s greatest movie of all time. But as critic Glenn Kenny writes, “Make no mistake: at a level of craft, and passion, Valley of the Bees is no less beautiful than Marketa Lazarová.” Set in the late 13th century, The Valley of the Bees centers on the violent Oedipal conflict between the lord of Vikov, a widowed Bohemian aristocrat, and his 12-year-old son Ondrej, a Teutonic Knight of the Cross, over the father’s remarriage to a child bride. An incident at the wedding, animalistic and ferocious, leads the lord to exile his son to the castle of a fanatical crusader of the Holy Order, Armin von Heide, to be indoctrinated in rituals of ascetic purification that will get him right with God. The Valley of the Bees was released in 1968, in the months between Prague Spring and the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, and its anti-totalitarian theme was lost on no one.
Restored in 2025, the sources for the digitization were the original image negative and the original sound negative preserved by the Národní filmový archiv, Prague.The digital restoration of this film, funded from the donation of Milada Kučerová and Eduard Kučera, was carried out in UPP and Soundsquare studios by the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in collaboration with the Národní filmový archiv, Prague, and the Czech Audiovisual Fund.