Synopsis
A nondescript man is trapped in a sinister flat, where nothing seems to obey the laws of nature.
The Flat
1968 ‘Byt’ Directed by Jan Švankmajer
Cast
Director
Writer
Editor
Cinematography
Composer
Studio
Country
Languages
Alternative Title
O Apartamento
Popular reviews
More-
really cool surreal horror short that combines genuinely funny silent era physical gags with a kafka-esque nightmare labyrinth that we are powerless to. the establishment of the room itself in terms of dilapidated look and texture followed by sudden bursts of delirious stop-motion that bend what you'd understand the laws of that space to be is really well done. also has a great ending, and a great juraj herz cameo as weird mustache dude carrying a chicken.
[35mm]
-
Almost like a nightmarish Looney Tunes production, The Flat while incredibly playful in the material turns near deathly sinister in tone as it progresses.
Svankmajer uses his masterful stop motion ability to transform what seems like an ideally normal apartment flat into a Venus fly trap consuming any of those that dare enter its confines. Essentially this short film is too an exercise in ability with not only Svankmajer's trademark animation on display but a marvel of camera tricks and editing. This time around it feels easy to get immersed in Svankmajer's environment and to a point even terrifying giving audience relation to the doomed protagonist and the ever growing danger that he finds himself in.
-
Jan Švankmajer's work has engaged inventively with a lot of classic authors - Poe, Carroll, de Sade, Walpole - but strangely never his fellow Czech absurdist Franz Kafka. This extraordinarily inventive monochrome short about a man enticed into a flat which then subjects him, as if it were sentient, to limitless frustrations might, then, be the nearest thing we get to that wonderful prospect of a Švankmajer Kafka adaptation - indeed, it cheekily fades out just as Švankmajer seems to be on the verge of acknowledging the debt.
Ivan Kraus, who even looks a little like Kafka, maintains an extraordinary poker face throughout the series of humiliations he's subjected to, including a scene involving a near-indestructible egg which you almost…
-
A man tumbles into a malicious flat. He follows chalk arrows to a shabby room where a mirror reflects the back of his head and the furniture is out to get him. The invention in this short is next level. It is gleefully cruel and its black humour shines through the darkness of the man’s nightmare.
-
-
'The Flat' or I like to call it 'man gets beaten and starved for trying to look at tiddies'.
I interpreted this as being a recreation of Švankmajer personal view of what a hell would look like. There is no comfort, there is no enjoyment. Everything is a cruel torment or joke to be played on you. I'm not religious at all but if hell was like that it would be truly terrifying. I think maybe the hatchet and the chicken could be a representation of the man's prior crimes.
Maybe he was a murderer? Who knows the beauty of Švankmajer's work is it is so open to interpretation, and if you're not in the mood to try and interpret his work. You can just enjoy the craziness of it all.
-
Pure lunacy and madness, trying to retake the German Expressionism influence depicted in the masterful Kyvadlo, Jáma a Nadeje (1983). Some Kafkaesque airs are present, but Svankmajer has always applied a distinctive signature of extraordinary talent. I need a cup of coffee...
91/100
-
Okay this goes hard. It’s like psychological horror slapstick all shot with very tight angles for comedy.
-
-
the government is a body that wants to test your limits
it does not want you to flourish
it wants you to struggle
make do with rocks instead of water
you are test piloting its cycle of withholding and death -
This is what it feels like to realize you’ve let a bunch of chores build up and have to do them all when you’re already busy
-
