Ladislav Mňačko
Writing
Known For

At the centre of Peter Patzak's existentialist film noir stands the hopeless struggle against the arms mafia in Czechoslovakia and its connections with Austria after the fall of the iron curtain.
Rochade

On Wednesday night, violent criminal Karl Schanz escapes from Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel prison. Disguised as a policeman, he manages to get to the apartment of young Christine, the wife of his best friend and former fellow inmate. Christine has no idea that Schanz has already stabbed a man to death during his escape. His goal: by taking the senior public prosecutor hostage, he wants to extort a million marks and a flight to South America...
Flucht

Pavel is a Czech partisan fighter in the waning days of the war. Just as peace is declared, Pavel is shot in the spine and sent to the hospital emergency ward. As he fades in and out of consciousness, he recalls the events that led to his participation in the underground. Holding German occupation commander Engelchen responsible for all the horrors and deprivations heaped upon his comrades, Pavel is kept alive by the possibility of recovering and exacting vengeance upon the Nazi officer - no matter how long it takes.
Death Is Called Engelchen

A young promising Olympian, Robert, shoots two police officers in a fit of rage. Lieutenant Morton sets out on his trail with a single goal in mind: to catch the killer.
The Taste Of Death

A psychological and existential study of a prisoner charged with guarding an isolated lighthouse. If he makes it through two years, the remainder of his sentence for manslaughter in a bar brawl will be pardoned. Nobody before managed to cope with the solitude. One day, a rat makes its way to the island. The sea and the island, the man and the rat, friendship and vendetta.
Der Leuchtturm

A young and an old man meet in a lonely, remote house. Who is who? What about the body that is on the first floor? Both distrust each other. A tough duel begins between them that ends fatally ...
Das einsame Haus
Television film
Festspiele
The television film based on the novel of the same name by Ladislav Mňaček draws on the period of World War II and the Slovak National Uprising. The film's story is composed of two intertwining time lines. In the images of the present that frame the entire narrative, the young partisan Voloďa - a hero with autobiographical features - recovers from a serious injury. In feverish reminiscences and in conversations with his nurse Eliška, he recapitulates the eventful events of his time in the partisan group in the village of Ploština, which the partisans abandoned under the pressure of events and left to the mercy of the German commando. Voloďa is haunted by visions of the burning Ploština, remorse and responsibility for the tragedy. In feverish reminiscences, he relives the meetings of the partisan detachment with the German commando. Memories of the mysterious Jewish girl Marta, a partisan liaison with whom Pavol had a passionate love affair, also return to him.
Smrť sa volá Engelchen

An artistic documentary based on a report of the same name from Ladislav Mňaček's book Where Dirt Roads End. A psychological reflection on the feelings of an individual who operates like a modern, fully automated control room of a large hydroelectric power plant. His subjective ideas intertwine with the environment of the workplace, accompanied by the music of J. S. Bach.
Man in a Great Hall
No description available.