The Cremator () is a 1969 Czechoslovak dark comedy horror film directed by Juraj Herz, based on a novel by Ladislav Fuks. The screenplay was written by Herz and Fuks. The film was selected as the Czechoslovak entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 42nd Academy Awards, but was not nominated.Margaret Herrick Library, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences In 1972, it won the Festival de Cine de Sitges Best Film award, where it also received awards for its star Rudolf Hrušínský and cinematographer Stanislav Milota.
Set in 1930s Prague, Karel Kopfrkingl slowly devolves from an odd but relatively well-meaning cremator of the dead into a murderer of his family and mass murderer who proposes to run the ovens at extermination camps due to the influence of the Nazi party and Tibetan Buddhism, as he believes his murders are "liberating" the souls of the deceased into a better life. The film consists mostly of monologues from Kopfrkingl that follow his descent into madness. Influenced by German Expressionist film, it is often cited as an example of the Czechoslovak New Wave. The film was withdrawn from circulation in 1973 and not seen again until 1990, after the collapse of the communist system in Czechoslovakia in 1989.
With a 90.2% score on the Czech and Slovak Movie Database as well as praise from film critics, The Cremator is often considered to be one of the best films ever made in Czechoslovakia. It has also gathered a prominent cult following.
Plot
The film takes place against the backdrop of the political radicalization of Europe during the 1930s, specifically the demise of the golden era of the First Czechoslovak Republic and the installation of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia under Nazi Germany in 1939. It is also set in the aftermath of the death of Thubten Gyatso, the 13th Dalai Lama, in 1933.
Karel Kopfrkingl works at a crematorium (his beloved "Temple of Death") in Prague. While taking his wife and children to visit the zoo to visit the leopard's cage where he first met his wife seventeen years previously, he mentions that he wishes to invite his new assistant Mr. Strauss to a gathering.
The gathering has many elderly people and those interested in funeral preparations. An "abstinent", Kopfrkingl wants no alcohol on the premises; only tea and "weak coffee" are to be served. He also puts out the cigar of a smoker. Kopfrkingl meets Strauss and tells him that he wants to take him on as an agent. Karel's wife Lakme compliments Strauss as being a good businessman and a Jew. Karel retorts that Strauss is a German surname but Lakme says names are not always what they appear. She says that her real name is Maria and that he only calls her Lakmé because of the opera; she reminds him that although he prefers the name Roman, his real name is Karel. Kopfrkingl just laughs and says that he is a "romantic". Kopfrkingl delivers a speech to them about the importance of cremation and the reincarnation that awaits them. It is clear that he is obsessed with his duties and believes he is not merely cremating the dead, but liberating the souls of the departed. Kopfrkingl gives a speech to the guests and reads excerpts from a book about Tibetan mysticism by David-Neel. This is his prized possession, one he frequently quotes from throughout the film (usually before committing murders).
At this gathering, Kopfrkingl meets Reinke, a former soldier who fought with him in the Austro-Hungarian army during W.W.I and who now works as a chemical engineer. Reinke is a supporter of Adolf Hitler who sees the annexation of Austria as liberation from unemployment and misery. He will introduce Kopfrkingl to the Nazi party. While browsing paintings he settles on a painting of Emiliano Chamorro Vargas that he brings home to his wife, claiming it is actually of Louis Marin. Reinke comes over to Kopfrkingl's house and describes in greater detail his support of Hitler and the good things the Nazis have done in Austria. He gives Kopfrkingl a flyer about joining the party, but Karel remains uncertain. He tells Reinke that he has been raised Czech, reads Czech and lives as a Czech, and that he has only "a drop of German blood". Reinke tells him that sensitive people like him can feel even just that one "drop".
Kopfrkingl shows the new assistant Mr. Dvorak the ropes at the crematorium. When discussing the crisis in Sudetenland Karel says he is not worried because he has "a drop of German blood". He asks a coworker he is smitten with to go on the tour of the facility with them but she refuses. Kopfrkingl shows Dvorak the catafalque and the coffin room. Dvorak bumps into a metal rod standing against the wall and Karel snaps at him not to throw it away because it could be very useful to them later. He also shows Dvorak a room filled with urns, all of which are filled with human ashes. Kopfrkingl is proud that he has "liberated" these people from the terrible sufferings of their life and sent them on to be reincarnated. Despite claiming to be moral and abstaining from smoking and alcohol, Kopfrkingl makes an unwanted sexual advance on the coworker he likes, visits a brothel run by "Mrs. Iris" (comically, the prostitute he chooses, named "Dagmar", is played by Vlasta Chramostová, the same actress who plays his wife) and drinks (though he assures his compatriots that it is only a "ceremonial glass"). He also has qualms about Mr. Dvorak's frequent smoking.
Karel takes his wife and children on visits to a carnival (in particular a wax museum displaying gruesome murders, severed heads and body parts) and to a boxing match, but it remains clear that he is aloof and cut off from them. At a Christmas Eve dinner, Karel openly mentions his new-found respect for the Nazi party and the Third Reich, which begins to worry his wife. On Reinke's orders, Kopfrkingl spies on a Jewish ceremony and makes a report at the Nazi-owned casino. Reinke thanks him for his work but warns him that his wife is possibly Jewish due to her having prepared a Jewish-style carp dinner for them on Christmas Eve and having hid an invitation from Reinke. He tells Karel that it will be impossible for him to get better positions within the party if he remains married to her.
Kopfrkingl, now under the sway of Reinke and his disturbed Buddhist beliefs, hangs his wife from a noose. He sees visions of himself as a Tibetan Buddhist monk assuring himself that he is doing the right thing by "liberating" his victims and that he will be rewarded by becoming the next Dalai Lama. The vision says he must prepare to journey to the eternal Fatherland in the Himalayas. Kopfrkingl delivers a eulogy for his wife, but it quickly descends into a Hitler-influenced mania about the importance of death in the new world order that the Führer is creating. Most of his former friends leave, but Reinke and his Nazi comrades are overjoyed and give him the Nazi salute.
Karel visits a brothel with his friend Reinke; they talk about Karel's son Mili. Karel says he is worried by how effeminate and weak he has become and that his mother's coddling is responsible. Reinke tells Karel that quarter-Jews will not be allowed to go to school or pursue careers in the Third Reich, so it is best to be rid of him. Karel then takes Mili on a trip to see the crematorium, taking a "scenic" shortcut through the graveyard. In the crematorium's basement, Karel kills his son with a metal rod in the belief that he is "liberating his soul". He puts his son in a coffin with a dead German soldier that will not be open for viewing and that will go straight into the oven. The vision reappears and tells him that he is the reincarnated Buddha. He tells the vision that he will ascend the Tibetan throne in Lhasa but only after he first liberates his part-Jewish daughter.
A Nazi leader tells Karel about the use of gas chambers, which he very much approves of. He sees it as a faster way to liberate more people than his crematorium, which only burns one coffin at a time. Overjoyed, he experiences mania but the Nazi minister tells him to calm down and remember to keep the plan secret. He takes his daughter to the basement of his crematorium and attempts to murder her with the iron rod, but she gets away when he has another vision of himself as a Buddhist monk. The monk tells him the time has come for him to rule the throne as the next Dalai Lama and that the people of the world beckon for his wise guidance. The crematorium briefly appears as a Tibetan monastery and the monk throws open the gates to reveal the Nazi commanders parked outside. He tells them that his daughter was about to be liberated but unfortunately got away, and they state that he need not worry as they will eliminate his daughter for him. In the final scene, Karel is driven away to oversee death camps with the female personification of death chasing after the car in the rain. He states "I shall save them all. The whole world". The closing shot is of the Potala Palace in Tibet.
Cast Rudolf Hrušínský as Karel Kopfrkingl Vlasta Chramostová as Lakmé; Dagmar Jana Stehnová as Zina Miloš Vognič as Mili Zora Božinová as Erna Reinkeová Ilja Prachař as Walter Reinke Eduard Kohout as Bettleheim Míla Myslíková as woman in hat Vladimír Menšík as husband of woman in hat Jiří Menzel as Dvořák Jiří Lír as Strauss Helena Anýzová as Death/ woman at cremation speech/ wax figure/ prostitute/ boxing match spectator Jindřich Narenta as Nazi friend of Reinke Marie Rosůlková as elderly woman who demands a Rakvička dessert Dimitri Rafalsky as Mr. Fenek (dubbed in Czech by Josef Kemr) Růžena Vlčková as Anežka Oldřich Vízner as Kája Václav Štekl as musician/ boxing referee/ wax museum showman Nataša Gollová as Mrs. Iris Jiří Hálek as Mr. Holý Jiří Kaftan as murderer in the wax museum Jan Kraus as Vojtech Prachar
Production The Cremator was Herz's second feature film. The film is based on a novel by Ladislav Fuks Spalovač mrtvol (). The main character is played by Rudolf Hrušínský, an actor previously known for his comedic main role as the soldier Josef Švejk in Dobrý voják Švejk and Poslušně hlásím.
Herz wrote the script first and then filmed exactly by the script. He was very pleased with the original script and mentioned that he had left extra space for empty pages in the back of the book for anything else that might come to mind, but those pages were never used.