The Fireman's Ball

Hoří, má panenko! (The Fireman's Ball)
Directed by	Miloš Forman
Produced by	Rudolf Hájek
Written by	Miloš Forman Ivan Passer Jaroslav Papoušek
Starring	Jan Vostrčil
Release date(s)	15 December 1967 (1967-12-15)
Running time	71 minutes
Country	Czechoslovakia
Language	Czech
Budget	$65,000

The Fireman's Ball (Czech: Hoří, má panenko) is a 1967 comedy 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 Czechoslovak New Wave.

Plot

The volunteer fire department in a small Czechoslovak town decides to organize a ball in a townhall with lottery and a beauty contest. The firefighters also plan to present a small fire axe as the birthday gift to their honorary chairman who has a cancer (although he doesn't know it).

During the ball the firefighter committee is assembled to look for eight candidates for the beauty contest, but they have difficulty to find enough of them. One of the fathers continues to buy drinks for the committee members to get his obese daughter accepted.

During the ball the lottery prizes start to disappear from the table, especially food and drink disappear first. Josef, one of the firefighters suggests that the prizes have been stolen and tries to get them back without success - even his wife is involved in stealing.

After much trouble enough candidates for the beauty contest are found and they are told that the winner will present a gift to their honorary chairman after the end of the contest. However, when the contest begins, the girls decide not to participate and lock themselves in the bathroom. Consequently, the firefighter committee uses force to draw the replacement candidates to the stage.

Soon after that the siren sounds because the house of an old man is on fire. All people immediately begin to leave the townhall without paying for the drinks they consumed. With the fire engine stuck in the snow the firefighters can only save some furniture from the house but are unable to put down the fire.

To help the old man who lost almost everything in a fire, the firefighters decide to present him the lottery prizes but almost all of them have been stolen during the ball (except for some smaller items of lesser value). The firefighters order the people to return the stolen prizes when the lights go out but during the period of darkness the remaining items are also stolen. Realizing this, the fire board move to the backstage to discuss what they can do about the situation so their reputation will be saved. After they return to the hall all people are gone, with the exception of their honorary chairman. The committee presents him a gift box with the fire axe. But when the box is opened it turns out that the axe itself has also been stolen.

Cast

• Jan Vostrcil as Head of Committee
• Josef Sebánek as Committee Member #2
• Josef Valnoha as Committee Member
• Frantisek Debelka as Committee Member #1
• Josef Kolb as Josef
• Jan Stöckl as Retired Fire Chief
• Vratislav Cermák as Committee Member
• Josef Rehorek as Committee Member #4
• Václav Novotný as Committee Member
• Frantisek Reinstein as Committee Member
• Frantisek Paska as Committee Member
• Stanislav Holubec as Karel
• Josef Kutálek as Ludva

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."

The movie was shot in a typical local Palace of Culture "Na střelnici" in Vrchlabí. Most of the actors were not professional actors (e.g. Josef Šebánek, Milada Ježková). To shoot the natural sound of their voices it was necessary to keep silence so during their dialogues the band just pretended to play and the dancing couples wore woollen socks or slippers.

Controversy

Forman has always maintained that the film has no "hidden symbols or double meanings".^{[citation needed]} 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.^{[citation needed]}

Awards

The film was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 41st Academy Awards. The film was also listed to compete at the 1968 Cannes Film Festival, but the festival was cancelled due to the events of May 1968 in France.

See also

• List of submissions to the 41st Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film
• List of Czechoslovakia submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film

External links

• The Fireman's Ball at the Internet Movie Database
• Hoří, má panenko!
  (The Fireman's Ball) at AllRovi
• Criterion Collection essay by J. Hoberman