"At the turn of the 10th and 11th centuries Boleslav's kingdom fell apart in the fratricidal war between the Premyslovci and the other clans the main profiteer of this being the German emperor. At that time it seemed as if the Czech state and the lineage of its princes was awaiting its end..." It is with these words that the tale of this film begins, whose narrative is based upon the the play by Frantisek Hrubín of the same name.

Ondrej lives on a farm outside a small town with his family. One day a group of men arrive at the family's house and the harmonious life they've led so far changes drastically for the worse.

The heroine of this drama about injustice during the collectivization of the Czech countryside is a proud widow, who arranges a magnifi cent funeral for her recently deceased husband. The funeral ceremony for this honourable farmer who had resisted the state-sanctioned liquidation of farmers and landholders is transformed into a manifestation of resistance against the Communist overlords. This story of the struggle against injustice was based on a novel by the dissident writer Eva KantÛrková, whose official publication was also prohibited during “normalization”. Sirov˘’s best film has the outline of a Classical tragedy and is framed by suggestive shots of the countryside. The film’s long-delayed premiere in 1990 was broadcast on television and attended by President Václav Havel. During “normalization” the director Zdenek Sirov˘ (1932-1995) primarily made his living doing film dubbing. He did make a number of quite ordinary adventure films and after the fall of Communism he shot an adaptation of the popular satire The Black Barons about conditions in the Communist military in the 1950s. During the final years of his life, cut short by disease, he was a respected teacher at Prague’s Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts.

一名颇有抱负的年轻人马特斯来到一个矿业村庄，认识了当地煤矿负责人离异的女儿海伦，相爱并结婚，虽然其父大力反对，但和其子伊万倒也相处融洽，为营造一个温馨家庭，马特斯不惜以偷为代价，梦想造一座绿树环绕的房子，事情败露后，马特斯也不幸坠崖身亡。音乐和画面十分优美，情节也不甚复杂，描述了战后斯洛伐克普通人的生活梦想，交杂了欢乐和惆怅