christopher-underwood I saw rather a lot of East European 60s cinema back in the day but had never heard of this one. Seems it only came to light recently so that explains that because otherwise I was bound to have stumbled upon it as it is such an amazing film. From the stunning opening credits, beyond the startlingly close-up shots of a family visit to the zoo, and on as the cremator of the title goes from seeming curious, to creepy and downright cuckoo, and worse. Spellbinding imagery plus the doings of this extremely worrying man hold ones attention throughout as this caring family man leads us and everybody else to the abyss. There are so many ways in which the director ensures that we follow his narrative flow despite ourselves. This is a very uncomfortable film to watch. The way the cremator has to touch everybody, dead and alive, the way he must comb his hair after that of a corpse and then his own family but there is so much worse to come.

morrison-dylan-fan Talking to a fellow IMDber on the Indian Cinema board,I got told about a pitch black Czech New Wave Comedy Horror that they had recently watched.Finding a Second Run edition of the movie,I decided that it was the perfect time to meet the cremator.The plot-WWII-Nazi Occupied Czechoslovak:Working as a cremator, Karel Kopfrkingl tells everyone that he believes that his cremations are helping to free the souls of the dead and to purify each of them. Admiring the power that Hitler and the Nazis display in cleaning the country of "decay",Kopfrkingl starts to follow their beliefs rigorously. Taking a closer look at his family and friends than ever before,Kopfrkingl starts to think of ways to cleanse the imperfections from his family.View on the film:Digging it out of the dirt,Second Run give the title a sparkling transfer,with the sound of gravestones landing with a thump and the fantastic image quality being far from cremated.Squeeze into a sharp Film Noir suit, Rudolf Hrusínský gives an utterly chilling performance as Kopfrkingl. Crawling along the grave yard, Hrusínský's gives Kopfrkingl a creepy,slug like appearance,which allows for everyone else to drop their guard,that causes Hrusínský to unleash the darkness from Kopfrkingl's squint eyes.Digging into the screen the year that the Warsaw Pact invasion of the country took place,the screenplay by co-writer/(along with Ladislav Fuks) director Juraj Herz stab the movie with merciless Comedy and vicious Film Noir Horror.Sliding away from light one- liners,the writers instead take a satirical cut over Kopfrkingl psychotic desire to get approval from the invaders,with Kopfrkingl killing anyone who does not have the perfections desired by his beloved invaders.Walking along the oil soaked comedy,Herz and Fuks cover Kopfrkingl in a Film Noir darkness,as a women in black towers above Kopfrkingl and looking on from every act for "perfection" he commits.Breaking open Kopfrkingl's cracked mind, Herz reveals the ideas of Kopfrkingl in ultra-stylised razor-sharp Czech New Wave editing,with the extreme close-ups and jagged shots casts a decayed Film Noir shadow over the title.As Kopfrkingl's lashes out at all the "flawed" people,Herz soaks the movie in a horribly morbid atmosphere,thanks to fish eye lens and lingering side shot tearing the frenzy inside Kopfrkingl's cremated mind.

MartinHafer The 1960s were an interesting time for Czechoslovakian cinema. It seems that they were making some amazing films about WWII and the Nazi era. I think the best of these was "The Shop on Main Street" but "Closely Watched Trains" was also an intriguing film. As for "The Cremator", it, too, is very good--but it's one you might have to force yourself to stick with, as the film, stylistically, is hard to love. But you need to stick with it--it's worth your time.The first thing I noticed about this movie was its deliberately 'artsy' style. Too many oddly framed closeups and an insistence on a roving camera made me initially hate the film. However, over time it began to grow on me. "The Cremator" is the story of Kopfrkingl---a really weird guy who loves his job of running the crematorium just before Czechoslovakia was absorbed by the Nazis in 1938. He is very philosophical and really loves the Tibetan "Book of the Dead". As a result, he believes his job is freeing souls from suffering so that they can be reincarnated to a better life. He also slowly comes to embrace the upcoming Nazi regime--a problem since his wife is half-Jewish. This problem their children slowly come to haunt this loving family man.What I liked was not only the weird places the plot goes and how Kopfrkingl solves his problem with Nazis, but the creepy way he's portrayed. I loved his use of the comb throughout the film--you just have to see it to know what I mean. It is truly an unusual and inventive plot. Strikes against it are the camera-work as well as the clothing and fashions. Yes, once again the history teacher within me rears its ugly head, but the folks in the film did NOT look like they were from 1938 but the 1960s. Their hair and clothes were all wrong--odd details to have missed and probably something that won't bother the less detail-obsessed out there. Still, overall it's very worth seeing--just force yourself to stick with this one despite its rather flat beginning.

Timothy Damon This film of Juraj Herj, like Morgiana, has a decidedly gothic feel. Karl Kopfrkingl, the owner of a modern crematorium gets creepier by the minute. At the beginning of the film at a family outing we see a snow leopard, peacock, tiger, snake, and a lion - Karl makes a comment that "cages are for mute persons." Later at a fair everyone else seems to be having a wonderful time; Karl looks quite glum. But when they enter a "chamber of horrors" exhibit, he's quite happy and intrigued while everyone else is shocked (it reminds me of one of Charles Addams' cartoons with everyone in a movie theatre crying, except for one man who seems positively overjoyed by the cinema situation).In a sense, Karl lives for dying - or at least lives to compassionately cremate as many people as he can, releasing and purifying their souls for another life. He seems to have a bit of an obsession with Tibetan Buddhism, carrying with him a tome on the Dalia Lama's palace and Buddhist customs.It doesn't take much flattery and cajoling by Nazi sympathizers to put Karl totally over the edge of sanity . . .Quite an incredible film, with good use of wide-angle lenses and closeups to indicate Karl's increasing derangement.