Jiří Vanýsek

„It was 1972 and we were shooting in April or May. Then we did a series called The village is jolly. I was just in the cutting room. Then the secretary came in and brought movies. And there was my old movie from 1968 regarding the political students’ movements. It was called the Forecast partly sunny. And I asked her: ‚Why is this here? What for?‘ And she said: ‚Well sadly it will be screened for the commission.‘ And at that moment I figured what was going to happen further on. That the movie is going to be projected for it was labelled as flawed. And of course it was from the perspective of the former normalisation. Then I went to the commission and had to defend myself, why I shot it; and all those politically right-wing opportunist ideas in it and so on. Well it was a clownery. As we all knew, even I did, that we – there was more of us, who left I think about seven people – were all tipped at the central committee of the communist party for cadre materials. Of course they banned me to produce such movies and the commission concluded I could not work on TV. It was simply decided as I was the son of the professor Vanýsek and I was not a member of the communist party so I was the target. And so was my son at the psychiatry clinic, which he had to leave.”

„Totalitarian thinking is in fact a thinking, which simplifies all matters; due to laziness and lack of intelligence or knowledge. Totalitarian thinking always aspires to label the world, to establish a kind of security, to secure state of matters. And there are many theories, which put everything into boxes and the society gets organised. Obviously it is always related to a certain personality becoming popular, possessing leadership qualities. Unfortunately that also applies to democracy. As the leaders, those with leadership qualities are not always the best of people. And totalitarianism is even related to so called clichés; such as good, evil, what is right and what is wrong.“