Year: 2023

Country of origin: Czech Republic

Producer: Joseph Viewegh

Broadcaster: Czech Television

Director: Jan Pachl

Writer: Jan Pachl

Actors: Kryštof Hádek, Klára Melíšková, Tomáš Jeřábek, Anna Geislerová, Martin Pechlát, Bohumil Klepl

Synopsis: Five part mini-series is a bitter comedy from those “splendid” twenty years in Czechoslovak Television. The story begins in the difficult time of the so-called normalisation period in 1971, just three years after the invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968 by allied Warsaw Pact armies…

Mini-series, is written in an unusual, bizarre and precisely reproduced language of the time. One can not only perceive it as a distinctive history of Czechoslovak Television but of Czechoslovakia in general. But at the same time, it is a portrait of the main protagonist, Standa Pekárek – a 20-year old somewhat limited egotist who, on the other hand, excels in coming up with minor swindles and tricks (how to pilfer petrol, falsify kilometrage used up in the company car, cheat on his wife, get rid of work competitors). One of his three greatest life’s wishes is to become the driver of a Soviet manufactured car, a Volga. For that reason (and others) he becomes an StB (Secret Police) agent using the cover name of Volga, and without any twinges of conscience diligently grasses on all his colleagues and passengers…