FRI?, Martin

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Nationality: Czech. Born: Prague, 29 March 1902. Family: Married actress Suzanne Marwille, 1932. Career: Actor in Prague and Bratislava, 1918; lab man, cameraman, and designer, 1919–21; began film acting, scriptwriting, 1922; began collaboration with Karel Lamac, 1924; billed as Mac Fri? on films made during occupation, 1940s; television director, from 1961; 1st Chairman, Union of Czechoslovakian Film and Television Artists, 1965. Awards: Recipient of National Artist; Order of the Republic; Laureate; State Prize. Died: 22 August 1968.

Films as Director (partial listing):

1928

Páter Vojt?ch (Father Vojtech) (+sc, role)

1929

Varhaník v sv. Víta (The Organist at St. Vitus) (+ co-sc); Chudá holka (Poor Girl) (+sc)

1930

Vše pro lásku (All for Love) (+co-sc)

1931

Der Zinker (The Informer) (co-d); On a jeho sestra (He and His Sister) (co-d); Dobrý voják Svejk (The Good Soldier Schweik) (+ ed)

1932

Kantor Ideál (Master Ideál); Sestra Angelika (Sister Angelica) (+ ed)

1933

Revisor (The Inspector) (+ ed); U sn?deného krámu (The Emptied-out Grocer's Shop) (+ ed); Pobo?ník Jeho Výsosti (Adjutant to His Highness) (+ ed); Zivot je pes (A Dog's Life) (+ co-sc); Dvanáct k?esel (The Twelve Chairs) (co-d); S vylou?ením ve?ejnosti (Closed Doors)

1934

Hej rup! (Heave-ho!) (+ ed, co-sc); Poslední muž (The Last Man); Mazlí?ek (Darling) (+ ed, co-sc)

1935

Hrdina jedné noci (Hero for a Night) (+ ed); Jánošík (ed, co-sc); Jedenácté p?ikázání (The Eleventh Commandment) (+ ed); A? žije nebožtik (Long Live the Deceased) (+ ed, co-sc)

1936

Pater Vojt?ch (Father Vojtech) (remake); Svadlenka (The Seamstress); Uli?ka v ráji (Paradise Road)

1937

Sv?t pat?í nám (The World Is Ours) (+ co-sc, role); Hordubalové (The Hordubals); Lidé na k?e (People on a Glacier)

1938

Krok do tmy (Madman in the Dark); Skola, základ života (School, the Basis of Life)

1939

Eva tropí hlouposti (The Escapades of Eva); Kristián (Christian) (+ co-sc); Muž z neznáma (The Reluctant Millionaire)

1940

Muzikantská Liduška (Liduška of the Stage; Musicians' Girl); Baron Prášil (Baron Munchhausen); Katakomby (Catacombs); Druhá sm?na (Second Tour)

1941

T?žký život dobrodruha (Hard Is the Life of an Adventurer); Hotel Modrá hv?zda (The Hotel Blue Star) (+ co-sc)

1942

Barbora Hlavsová

1943

Experiment; Der zweite Schuss (The Second Shot) (+ co-sc)

1944

Po?estné paní pardubické (The Virtuous Dames of Pardubice); Prstýnek (The Wedding Ring)

1945

13. revír (Beat 13)

1947

Varuj! (Warning!) (+ co-sc); Capkovy povídky (Tales from Capek) (+ co-sc)

1948

Návrat domu (Lost in Prague); Polibek ze stadionu (A Kiss from Stadium) (+ co-sc)

1949

P?tistovka (Motorcycles); Pytlákova schovanka (The Kind Millionaire)

1950

Past (The Trap); Zoceleni (Tempered Steel; Steel Town)

1951

Císa?v peka? a Peka?uv peka? (The Emperor's Baker and the Baker's Emperor) (+ co-sc); Akce B (Action B) (+ co-sc)

1953

Tajemství krve (The Secret of Blood) (+ co-sc)

1954

Psohlavci (Dog-Heads) (+ co-sc)

1955

Nechte to na mn? (Leave It to Me) (+ co-sc)

1956

Zaost?it, prosím (Watch the Birdie!) (+ co-sc)

1958

Povode? (The Flood); Dnes naposled (Today for the Last Time)

1959

Princezna se zlatou hv?zdou (The Princess with the Golden Star) (+ co-sc)

1960

Da?buján a Pandrhola (A Compact with Death); Bilá spona (The White Slide)

1963

Krák Králu (King of Kings); T?i zlaté vlasy d?da Všev?da (The Three Golden Hairs of Old Man Know-All)

1964

Hv?zda zvaná Pelyn?k (A Star Named Wormwood)

1966

Lidé z maringotek (People on Wheels) (+ co-sc)

1967

P?ísn? tajné premiéry (Recipe for a Crime; Strictly Secret Previews)

1968

Nejlepší ženská mého života (The Best Woman of My Life) (+ co-sc)

Publications

By FRI?: article—

Interview, in Closely Watched Films, by Antonín Liehm, White Plains, New York, 1974.

On FRI?: book—

Modern Czechoslovak film, Prague, 1965.

On FRI?: articles—

Hrbas, J., "Martin Fri?: Lidový vypráv??," (in four parts) in Filma Doba (Prague), January through April 1972.

Dewey, L., "Czechoslovakia: Silence into Sound," in Film (London), no. 60.

Taussig, P., Film a Doba (Prague), December 1983 and April 1984.

Bartosek, L., "Scenes from the History of Czechoslovak Cinema," in Czechoslovak Film (Prague), Summer 1985.

* * *

Scion of a notable middle-class Prague family, Martin Fri? left the road marked out by family tradition at the age of sixteen to follow the uncertain path of a cabaret performer, actor, and filmmaker. In 1919 he designed a poster for Jan Stanislav Kolár's film Dáma s malou nozkou (Lady with a Little Foot), and thus began his years of apprenticeship. He was by turns an actor, a scenarist, a film laboratory worker, and a cameraman. Of crucial importance to the young Fri? was his collaboration and friendship with Karel Lamac, the most influential director in Czech film. Lamac taught him the film trade and enabled him to become familiar with the film studios of Berlin and Paris.

In 1928 Fri? made his debut with the film Páter Vojt?ch (Father Vojtech) and followed it immediately with his most important film of the silent era, Varhaník u sv. Vita (The Organist at St. Vitus), which dealt with the tragedy of a man suspected of murder. In the sound era Fri? quickly gained a position of prominence, chiefly through his ability to work quickly (making up to six films a year) and, no matter the circumstances, with surprising ease and dexterity. Comedy became his domain. His comedies, often produced in two–language versions (German or French), featured popular comedians as well as actors and actresses whose comic talent he recognized and helped to develop. First and foremost of these was Vlasta Burián, who appeared in the situation comedies On a jeho sestra (He and His Sister) with Anny Ondrákova, Pobo?ník Jeho Výsosti (Adjutant to His Highness), Dvanáct k?esel (The Twelve Chairs), Katakomby (Catacombs), and also in the film adaptation of Gogol's Revisor (The Inspector).

Fri? had much to do with shaping the film acting of Hugo Haas in such films as Zivot je pes (A Dog's Life—the first Czech screwball comedy with Adina Mandlová), A? žije nebožlík (Long Live the Deceased), Jedenácté p?ikázání (The Eleventh Commandment), and Uli?ka a ráji (Paradise Road). Together with Voskovec and Werich he made the social comedy Hej rup! (Heave-ho) and the modern political satire Sv?t pat?í nám (The World Is Ours). Then came Kristián (Christian), a social comedy with Oldrich Nový that is undoubtedly Fri?'s best work.

But Fri? also demonstrated his directorial abilities in infrequent excursions into other genres. His Jánošík, a poetic epic about a legendary highwayman, is one of the pinnacles of Czechoslovak cinematography. Fri? showed sensitivity and an understanding of the atmosphere of the time in his film rendition of U sn?deného krámu (The Emptied-out Grocer's Shop), a story by the nineteenth-century Czech writer Ignát Hermann. He also made felicitous film versions of the dramas Hordubalové (The Hordubals), based on the novel by Karel Capek, Lidé na k?e (People on a Glacier), and Barbora Hlavsová. Following the nationalization of Czechoslovak filmmaking, Fri? aided in the development of filmmaking in Slovakia with his film Varuj. . . ! (Warning!). In 1949, in collaboration with Oldrich Nový, he fashioned his next masterpiece, Pytlákova schovanka (The Kind Millionaire), a parody of film kitsch. Following the successful costume comedy Císa?uv peka? a Peka?uv peka? (The Emperor's Baker and the Baker's Emperor) with Jan Werich, and an excursion into the biographical genre with the film Tajemství krve (The Secret of Blood), Fri? made a few films that were—for the first time, actually—neither a popular nor a critical success.

Fri?'s last creative surge came at the beginning of the 1960s. He made fine adaptations for Czechoslovak television and directed Chekhov's tales Medved (The Bear), Slzy, které sv? nevidi (Tears the World Can't See), and Námluvy (Courting), and once more returned to the studios. The tragicomedy Hv?zda zvaná Pelyn?k (A Star Named Wormwood) and the comedy Nejlepší ženská mého života (The Best Woman of My Life), the premieres of which he did not live to see, close out his final period of creativity.

Fri?'s creation is the work of a solid and honest artist who demonstrated his talent in diverse genres from psychological drama to madcap comedy. He produced two masterful comedies, Kristián and

Pytlákova schovanka, which can be numbered among the world's best of the period. The best proof of the quality and vitality of his creative work is the fact that almost a third of the films he made are still shown in the theaters of Czechoslovakia, where they bring pleasure to new generations of viewers.

—Vladimír Opela