Jump to content

Skeleton on Horseback

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from Bílá nemoc (film))
Skeleton on Horseback
Directed byHugo Haas
Written byHugo Haas
Based onBílá nemoc
by Karel Čapek
Produced byJan Sinnreich
Vladimír Kabelík
StarringHugo Haas
Zdeněk Štěpánek
CinematographyOtto Heller
Edited byAntonín Zelenka
Music byJan Branberger
Production
company
Moldaviafilm
Distributed byMoldaviafilm
Release date
  • 21 December 1937 (1937-12-21)
Running time
103 minutes
CountryCzechoslovakia
LanguageCzech

Skeleton on Horseback aka The White Disease (Czech: Bílá nemoc) is a 1937 Czechoslovak drama film directed by and starring Hugo Haas. It revolves around an infectious disease which breaks out during a war. It is based on the play The White Disease by Karel Čapek.[1]

Cast

[edit]

Reception

[edit]

In a contemporary review, the film was reviewed in Variety in 1940, who noted that Čapek's conception "isn't entirely clear, he appears to be taking the dramatic theme that Fascism is a sort of white plague that scourges the people who follow its philosophy." The reviewer noted that Čapek's "thinking is logical [but] he has certainly over-simplified the struggle between war and peace."[2] The review continued that the film contained "many gripping scenes" praising "moments such as the meeting between the doctor and the dictator and the solitary vigil as zero hour for the invasion approaches, while "mob scenes are comparatively inept, and such matters as sound, lighting, photography and so on are inferior."[2]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "The White Disease". Filmový přehled. NFA. Retrieved 2020-02-24.
  2. ^ a b Willis, Donald, ed. (1985). Variety's Complete Science Fiction Reviews. Garland. pp. 65–66. ISBN 0-8240-6263-9.
[edit]