Even children from a civilisation conquered by technology need fairy stories and Mrs Fairytale invites them into her world. A woodcutter goes into the forest with his children, Jeníček and Mařenka. While their father is working the children pick strawberries. However, they wander so deep into the forest that they lose their way back. After a sinister night the children find themselves in front of a cottage made of honey gingerbread. An old hag catches them picking bits of gingerbread off her house. She locks the thin Jeníček in a cage to feed him up and she makes the chubby Mařenka work for her in the kitchen. The children are visited by benign angels in their sleep, however, who give them hope that they will be saved. When the old hag decides to bake them in the oven, Mařenka and Jeníček push her in there instead. The oven explodes and the ugly little old crones who had been dancing attendance on the witch, are transformed into children. Mařenka gives them back their little hearts, enchanted in the gingerbread by the old hag. All are dancing for joy in the field in front of the gingerbread house when, suddenly, Jeníček and Mařenka's grief-stricken parents appear from the forest, overjoyed at having found them at last.
The gingerbread used for the house was supplied by Pulchart, Prague-Libeň. This theme had already been treated in a Czech film under the same title (1927; directed by Josef Kokeisl).
Jeníček
Mařenka
tatínek
maminka
ježibaba
královna noci
královna víl
Pohádka
vodník/Smrt
hvězdy/víly/andělé/žabáci/čarodějnice
začarované děti
Antonín Frič (fotograf), František Rubáš (fotograf)
Perníková chaloupka
Perníková chaloupka
The Gingerbread House
Hänsel und Gretl
film
featuretheatrical distribution
fairytale
Czechoslovakia
1933
1933
start of filming 30 June 1933 (ateliéry)
date of censorship 11/1933
date of censorship 09/1939
premiere 22 December 1933 /suitable for youths/ (kina Beránek /2 týdny/, Radio /2 týdny/, Roxy /2 týdny/ a Světozor /2 týdny/, Praha /odpolední představení/)
feature film
64 min
1 900 meters
35mm
1:1,19
black & white
sound
Tobis – Klang
Czech
Czech
without subtitles
Czech