He graduated from DAMU, after which he played for three seasons at the Vinohrady Theatre (then the Czechoslovak Army Theatre). He then anchored at the Drama Club until 1992, where his performances won him critical acclaim. He briefly performed at the National Theatre, but left the theatre permanently in August 1994. He became popular with the public mainly thanks to his appearances in film and television. His first major film role was given to him in 1962 by director Brynych in the film Transport from Paradise (1962). This was followed by the roles of the expectant father in The Scream (1963) and the writer Hašek, whom he played in The Great Journey (1963). In the film Man Against Destruction (1989) he played the main role of the writer Karel Čapek. From 1990 to 1995 he performed in accompanying programmes at exhibitions (Herbert Masaryk, T. G. Masaryk - Man and Art) organised by the Masaryk Democratic Movement. In 2006 he was nominated for the Czech Lion in the category of supporting actor. After an eight-year relationship with Nadia Urbánková, he was married to actress Libuša Šafránková from 1976 (until her death in June 2021). They have a son Josef (* 1977), who has 4 children - two sons with his first wife Denisa Grimmová, a director, sons Josef (* 2006) and Antonín (* 2009) and a daughter Laura and a son Benjamin with his second wife Ludmila. Description above from the Wikipedia article Josef Abrhám, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Thirty Cases of Major Zeman is a Czechoslovak action-drama television show intended as a political propaganda to support the official attitude of the communist party. The series were filmed in the 1970s. Each episode encompasses one year, and investigations are stylized to that year. Most are inspired by real cases. The series follows the life of police investigator Jan Zeman during his career from 1945 to 1975....
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Hospital at the End of the City is a popular television series first released in Czechoslovakia in 1977, it featured an ensemble cast and received much viewer praise in central Europe. The series ran from 1977 to 1981 for a total of twenty episodes. The success of the series inspired the German television series The Black Forest Clinic....
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“A bored housewife, a husband who married her for show, and a stupid boy who is full of himself because he is dating a Swiss woman.” The words of Inspector Tůma sound like they’re from a European melodrama, but in fact they come from a Czechoslovak crime story. A pair of detectives, counterfeit medicine, the high-society setting of a Karlovy Vary hotel, and Oldřich Nový as the aging hotel manager Kraus....
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Prague, Czechoslovakia, during the inter-war period. Jan Dítě, a young and clever waiter who wants to become a millionaire, comes to the conclusion that to achieve his ambitious goal he must be diligent, listen and observe as much as he can, be always discreet and use what he learns to his own advantage; but the turbulent tides of history will continually stand in his way....
A comedy about exchange of 12 apartments , which, its organizer, lawyer Radosta, rightly called Action Ball Lightning. To prepare, organize and execute the exchange of twelve apartments is a work worthy champions. Radosta, who was excellently played by Rudolf Hrušínský, solved all sudden difficulties and complications on the fly and with grace. To be sure that the on the D-day everything goes well he prepares a little rehearsal, which reveals many minor issues caused for example by wedding order...
A comedy concerning a down on his luck bookshop owner with a penchant for women who decides to make some money by pretending to be a waiter and collecting cash from unsuspecting diners....
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In a suburban villa, a woman of means is murdered. Police Superintendent Zdychynec from the Prague Liben neighborhood reports the case to Police Councilman Vacátko, upon whose order an investigation is launched immediately. Zdychynec begins to suspect the wooer of his own daughter, a handsome dragoon named Rudi, of the crime. In Rudi's absence, Zdychynec searches his rented room in the apartment of the elegant Mrs Dragicová. All his findings - among others, sand left on Rudi's jackboots and a de...
A dark comedy about a murder and its consequences presented in a backwards manner, where death is actually a rebirth. The film starts with an "execution" of the main protagonist and goes back to explore his previous actions and motivations....
A police inspector and inexperienced trainee search for a mysteriously disappeared manufacturer of ointments for hair growth....
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Jealous of her vapidly "good" sister's popularity, poisonous Viktoria doses pretty Klara's tea with a slow-acting fatal substance. As the latter grows hysterically weak, the former finds success increasingly compromised by guilt, blackmail, and the pesky need to kill others lest she be exposed....
A period musical comedy set in a quiet Prague quarter at the end of the fifties. Using the western plot device of the "man from nowhere" a generation gap story unfolds of changing social climate. The action is driven by the character of a young man named Baby who causes a local rebellion by bringing rock'n'roll to a Communist neighborhood raised on swing....
This comedy is about one average family. The father works as master in the factory and his son is studying on high school. One day father must start to visit the evening school. It's the same school as his son visiting. The lives both students are connecting together. The son must teach the math and physics his own father. The father getting to know, that the life of the students is not simple as he supposed....
A bitter sweet comedy that follows a highly appointed Chancellor who set to step down from his position after years of service to his country. With just two last days left to enjoy his palatial villa before he is finally evicted, his situation gradually goes from bad to worse....
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Marcela can't bear Jarda any longer, so she threatens divorce and takes the kids to her mom's, whose husband is a creep. While Marcela is there, Jarda is jailed, because he is part of a gang steeling cars and they get caught in the act. Benes, the urbane man whose car got stolen by Jarda and his gang, befriends Marcela. Soon she feels drawn to Benes and all of a sudden she must make up her mind: Jarda is still sexually attractive to her, but Benes offers security, and her own body and mind may n...
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Told from the perspective of man reflecting on his childhood in Prague in the early years of World War II and the eventual destruction of his family as the Nazis rise to power. The storyline focuses heavily on Jewish-Czech Silberstein family members. Drama was filmed on the real events as a tribute to Mr. Nicholas Winton, the British humanitarian who organized the rescue of 669 children, most of them Jewish, from Czechoslovakia on the eve of the Second World War in an operation later known as th...
Engineer Jan Sebek (Jan Kacer) is undergoing treatment in a mental home after his unsuccessful attempt to commit suicide. His therapist, via discussions both with the patient and with people who know him, tries to find out what made the young and seemingly satisfied man decide to end his own life. Jan's pretty wife Jana (Jana Brejchová) claims not to know about anything but she is conducting an affair with a family friend, almost publicly and with the blessing of her parents....
At a village railway station in occupied Czechoslovakia, a bumbling dispatcher’s apprentice longs to liberate himself from his virginity. Oblivious to the war and the resistance that surrounds him, this young man embarks on a journey of sexual awakening and self-discovery, encountering a universe of frustration, eroticism, and adventure within his sleepy backwater depot....
Unlike any other opera, the so-called Beggar's Opera is not just one composition, but a lineage of adapted compositions, beginning with the original hugely successful 1728 political satire written by Englishman John Gay. Composers and writers have penned variations on it ever since. The most famous of these was A Threepenny Opera by Bertholt Brecht and Kurt Weill. Some things these compositions share in common is their setting among the poor and criminal classes, and the roguish character Machea...
A passionate communist worker is discouraged by the changing political climate and the failure of his peers to live up to his ideals....
A professor reunites with an old friend who inspires him to return to Czechoslovakia for the first time since he emigrated years ago....
Charming, witty and smart men represent a fictitious insurance company who soon fall for an innocent-looking young woman smarter than she seems....
Comedy based on short Sean O'Casey play. John Jo Mulligan finds himself in a situation with which his pious conscience cannot cope. He has spent a night with the cunning seductress Angela. Full of remorse and dreading the ruin of his reputation, he tries to get rid of her, fearing that his pal Halibut or his landlady Miss Mossie might get to know. Angela sees her chance, turns gold-digger and does not leave before relieving John of a considerable amount of money....
Biography of Karel Čapek....
A stuffy middle-aged foreigner, a businessman named Fabricius, lonely and looking for a night's diversion, finds it in the form of a mysterious blonde. In an abandoned cemetery, she tells him three tales involving black magic and erotic obsession. In "The Last Golem," a young rabbi struggles to fashion a massive, silent giant out of living clay — until he's distracted by a mute servant girl. In the second episode, "Bread Slippers," an 18th-century countess indulges her passion for sweet cakes, a...
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The film is essentially a feature-length commercial for an exhibition to mark the 40th anniversary of the nationalisation of the Czechoslovak film industry, to be held at the Prague U Hybernu venue. The protagonists of the piece are comedians Oldrich Kaiser and Jirí Lábus, who are set to accept an award from Japanese television representatives at the exhibition. At the same time, five gangsters plot to seize a revolutionary invention devised by professor Suzuki - a super holograph, which enables...
Charming 60-something José returns to Prague after 30 years living in Mexico, though he was convinced that he would never see his hometown again. He was persuaded by his deeply religious Mexican wife Dolores, who is convinced that only a miracle that might be fulfilled by Prague’s famous Infant Jesus can help their daughter Penelopé get pregnant. And the ideal time for this is Christmas. And when Ruda, his friend from Prague, also insists, José agrees to return to the places he used to know and ...
Czechoslovakian Zbynek Brynych directs this psychological drama set in World War II Terezin ghetto. A dark, visual portrayal of the trials and tribulations the Theresienstadt people faced on a daily basis presented in a series of memorable stories. Their hopes and dreams unfold against the perpetual threat of deportation (or worse) by the Nazis. Based on the novel "Night and Hope" by Arnost Lustig....
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The series follows Cyril and Methodius, two Byzantine Greek brothers born in the 9th century. They became missionaries of Christianity and influenced the cultural development of the Great Moravian territory....
Czechoslovak comedy film directed by Ladislav Smoljak, about the fictional national hero Jára Cimrman (universal genius, inventor, sportsman, criminalist, poet, writer and philosopher)....
Police find a girl with a bleeding face in a small town park at night. First the girl, a textile factory worker Jana, refuses to talk, and then she decides to tell the truth. After her father's death she, by herself, takes care of her younger brother called Pinda. She does not like the influence that a gang of older boys from the factory exercise over her brother. The gang leader Jirka, called King, is admire by local girls whose number exceeds boys in the town because there are many textile fac...
The waitress Gita from the hotel "Bobí vrch" approaches her lover who has not left his wife yet and gives him an ultimatum: if he does not do all according to her wish, she will announce to the police his machinations with foreign currency....
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A scientist meets a nice girl and they start dating. He decides the only way to find out for sure if she’s the one is to take a long trip with her, but things don’t go quite as he’d hoped....
While a woman is in the hospital preparing to deliver her child, her husband has all day to reflect upon his wife and their relationship. As he tends to his job as a television repairman, Slavek fondly remembers how he first met Ivana and the days they spent getting to know one another. Slavek also grows increasingly aware of the environment that surrounds him and questions the society his new child will be entering. Loaded with a repeated plea for social change, this is the first feature from C...
This movie is based on texts of Bohumil Hrabal, world-known Czech prosaic. It's a story (in a form of a mosaic of short episodes and pictures) about the sadness and happiness of inhabitants of Kersko (Kersko is a small woody area full of cottages and roods). These people are both simple and sensitive, they have their own pleasures (e.g. Leli is a collector of cheap, but inutile things) and the greatest delight of all of them is a hunting. Crude poetics of amateur hunting is screened by dreamy pi...
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A theater play by Václav Havel....
Czechoslovakia, 1942. Three brave Czech patriots risk everything to rid their country of its brutal Nazi leader, SS-General Reinhard Heydrich....
A beautiful, underachieving, 18-year-old orphan considers various suitors, ponders philosophy, and takes a young girl under her wing....
The young Marta has made a break in her medical education to fully invest in her career as a model. We follow her for a day in her life, almost completely without hearing her voice. It is seldom that Marta gets the space to speak, instead she is mostly subject to the voice of others....
Czechoslovakia 1918. The newly formed National Assembly has made Stoklasa the administrator of the Kratochvile Castle. Although with no aristocratic background, he is a man of fortune and is trying to buy the castle. To impress his neighbors and the local politicians he invites them to a great hunting party. Uninvited comes a man who claims to be Duke Alexej. Stoklasa believes him to be a hustler. This hustler, however, manages to charm all the women before he leaves....
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A story that takes place during Advent, we'll meet again with your favorite pair angel Petronel and devil Urias. Their eternal wrangling causes the rare apple from the tree of the knowledge to roll on earth. And that God is really angry. Petronel with Urias find themselves in a small Czech town on the eve of the feast of St. Nicholas. And after a series of human and "divine" tests our heroes eventually find that the path to knowledge leads primarily through self discovery through the strength ...
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A psychological drama exploring the notion of the doctor as a moral authority, who within the framework of their everyday work must face questions of life and death. The film is adapted from a novel by Valja Stýblová, in which the author draws upon her personal experiences as a former neurosurgeon. The protagonist of this drama is an ageing professor, based at a Prague neurological clinic, who is haunted by issues concerning his own principles and values, and also by the case of a young patient,...
In 1992, Prague is the capital of a small kingdom. The prince is supposed to choose his bride to be at a royal ball. But to everybody's surprise, he chooses an ugly cleaning-woman. She is shy and silent, but after the marriage she turns into a wild and rumbustious woman with an obstinate and stubborn mind. They both try to kill each other, but the queen is thrown into the dungeons....
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A story of a man threatened by a fatal illness evaluating his life (the number 322 in the film title stands for the diagnosis of one kind of cancer). He understands his illness as a form of punishment for his cruel deeds in the 1950s. In the face of reality and his efforts to cleanse himself he hits a barrier of indifference, lack of interest, and individual and collective selfishness. He has to find his own reconciliation with his illness and his past and present life....
About the great Czech satirist Jaroslav Hašek, who was captured by the Russians during the First World War. Not wanting to fight for the interests of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, Hašek enters the Red Army and, as a commissar of the international brigade, goes the military way from Samara to Irkutsk....
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This film brings us back to show us the life of the famous ancient sage Aesop, who helped people with his wisdom in their struggle for freedom and happiness....
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Film by Toman and Gajer....
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Lada is a little boy who likes to read fiction and has a great imagination. He figures out that his sister Eva's boyfriend is a vampire, and so he and his brother put him through various tests that, in effect, cause Eva and her boyfriend to break up for real....
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A few days in the life of a Czechoslovak teenager when he starts work....
In the mid-eighties, screenwriter and director Jaroslav Balík tried to give voice to the problems of an ambitious young woman who decides to get back to work after a few years spent on maternity leave. NFA.CZ...
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Kafka, an insurance worker gets embroiled in an underground group after a co-worker is murdered. The underground group is responsible for bombings all over town, attempting to thwart a secret organization that controls the major events in society. He eventually penetrates the secret organization and must confront them....
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A dark fable set in an early 1950s Czech village, a time of Soviet-style socialism which saw the implementation of collectivized agriculture and the mass closure of monasteries and convents....
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