12A, 87mins
Dreams can be poisonous. This, I guess, is the point of Vít Klusák and Filip Remunda’s bizarre documentary Czech Dream. Using a government grant and pure cheek, the two university students persuade coachloads of eager shoppers to turn up for the opening of a supermarket that doesn’t exist.
To “sell” the idea they employ marketing firms to dress them in Hugo Boss suits and advertising companies to blitz Prague with spoof billboards. They interview potty families who happily admit that a shopping mall is the high point of their social life, and get thoroughly high on their own sham.
The alarming detail is that the young directors make no bones about the fact that their supermarket is a fantasy. Yet four thousand people arrive in an empty field and their scam makes headlines across the world. “What else do old folks do?” asks a veteran shopper, mopping his brow, searching the skyline for a cheap TV. “We browse stores.”
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He’s one of the few who takes the “joke” on the chin. Others are not so amused. The atmosphere surrounding the red ribbon ceremony in a sunny meadow is thick with anger and frustration. The students are nearly lynched. They blame the clumsy pro-euro opportunism of their prime minister. Their campaign has turned to fudge. They’re lucky to be alive.