It would be incredible if this is ever included in a re-release of Barta’s collected shorts on Kino/Kimstim. I’ve had the dvd for years, not sure if there’s a blu ray. Wish I could understand Czech! Either way this is fantastic, thank you for sharing!!
Roughly translated what I could with Google. Only translated about 3 minutes into the video. Would love to know what the documentary is saying if there is anybody that could help. "After almost two years, from August 1983 to June 1985, the team worked in Jiri Trnka's studio in Prague for one of the most demanding projects in the history of Czech puppet film, The Legend of the Rat [Catcher?] For 700 years, this gloomy North German legend has spilled over into oral tradition. To medieval scholars, writers, and to satire, novellas, and theatrical plays, to be part of European culture. The magical visuals of the story, which attracts with its various strangenesses from the myths that emerge from a different realm. The half-knowing knowledge of distress and of the idea of an emaciated, melancholic rat with an impenetrable face. The puppet play of a rat was born in Prague, according to the screenplay by the deserving artist Kamil Pixa, and directed by Jiri Barta, who was also the artist of the film. " A mysterious whistler, angry with the councilors about the amount of the reward, rid the corrupt city of the rich. Ratcatcher, the peculiar stranger. Nameless wanderer, with a fateful job. A grotesque Mephistopheles to the characters that long for the dead."
