THE FIREMEN'S BALL

'''The Firemen's Ball''' (Czech: '''Hoří, má panenko''') is a 1967 film directed by Miloš Forman. It is set at the annual ball of a small town's volunteer fire department, and the plot consists of a collection of anecdotes told within that setting. The film uses no actors - the firemen portrayed are the firemen of the small town where it is set.
''The Fireman's Ball'' was the last film Forman would make in his native Czechoslovakia. It is also the first film he shot in color, and a milestone of the Czech New Wave.

Contents

Background

Controversy

External links

Background

After the success of ''Loves of a Blonde'' (1965), Forman, along with fellow screenwriters Ivan Passer and Jaroslav Papoušek, could not concentrate on their follow-up screenplay and so went to the north Bohemian town of Vrchlabí to hole up in a hotel and concentrate on writing. "One evening, to amuse ourselves, we went to a real firemen's ball," Forman recalls. "What we saw was such a nightmare that we couldn't stop talking about it. So we abandoned what we were writing on to start this script."

Controversy

Forman has always maintained that the film has no "hidden symbols or double meanings". However, the Czechoslovak head of state as well as the censors of the time viewed it as a political allegory. The film ran for three weeks during the Dubcek era, but after the Prague Spring crackdown, was "banned forever".
Carlo Ponti, the film's Italian producer, also took umbrage at the film and pulled his financing, leaving Forman to face a possible 10 years imprisonment for "economic damage to the state". Fortunately, producers in Paris picked up the rights and spared him of the charges. The Prague Spring invasion occurred while Forman was still in Paris courting these producers, forcing him to emigrate.

External links

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★ Criterion Collection essay by J. Hoberman