Panelstory

A new suburban housing block in the midst of either construction or destruction provides the site of Věra Chytilová’s biting satire of official incompetence and corruption and of the resourcefulness and/or deceit of those left living in its cracks. Like a downmarket Decalogue, the film introduces a host of characters as they lie, love, and push prams through the mud of this new socialist nightmare. While made with none of the freedoms of Daisies, Panelstory still bristles with Chytilová’s radical spirit. Now more seething than screaming, the anger remains; “how are you supposed to cope?” indeed.