Filmmakers during the 1960s most often opted to adapt one of Josef Škvorecký's crime stories when it came to making a silver screen version of one of the author's literary works. The first director to show interest in the popular writer was Jiří Menzel. In 1965, he directed the crime comedy Zločin v dívčí škole (Crime at the Girls' School), a motion picture that combines another two stories with the title piece. These are Smrt na jehle (Death at the Needle) and Jak se koupe žena (How a Woman Bathes). Škvorecký, who provided input during the screenwriting, was able to introduce his favourite hero, gloomy lieutenant Borůvka, to the world of cinema. Played by Lubomír Lipský, the detective investigates a theft in a girls’ school attended by his daughter Zuzanka (Hana Horáčková). Rather than tracking the missing money, Borůvka soon turns his attention to the disappearance of the unpopular maths teacher, Professor Kotě, and to his daughter’s secret sexual life… Brothers Petr and Matěj Forman, then just one-year-old make brief film debuts as twin infants.
Three short stories.
Bohuslav Kück (fotograf)
Zločin v dívčí škole
Zločin v dívčí škole
The Crime at the Girl’s School
povídkový film
featuretheatrical distribution
detective, short-story
Czechoslovakia
1965
1965
literary Screenplay approved 8 April 1965
technical Screenplay approved 20 April 1965
start of filming 10 May 1965
end of filming 4 July 1965
projection approval 11 November 1965
withdrawal from distribution 6 April 1973
premiere 18 February 1966 /unsuitable for youths/ (celostátní)
premiere 25 February 1966 /unsuitable for youths/ (kina Jalta /6½ týdne/, Metro /3 týdny/, Arbes /1 týden od 25. 3./ a Oko /1 týden od 8. 4./, Praha)
Tvůrčí skupina Šebor – Bor, Vladimír Bor (vedoucí dramaturg tvůrčí skupiny), Jiří Šebor (vedoucí výroby tvůrčí skupiny)
feature film
106 min
3 004 meters
16mm, 35mm
1:1,37
black & white
sound
mono
Czech
Czech
without subtitles
Czech