Eeny Meeny

A story of discord, disaffection and torpor among a committee of ballot-box monitors in a small Czech town on election day, this first feature offers a gently poignant glimpse of familial and political growing pains and generational torch passing. It centres on a daughter-mother-father triangle. Student Jana (Remundová) is home from her first term at college, and surreptitiously stuck on James Joyce and her tutor; her faithful mother (Janzurová) is meanwhile battling to maintain her slightly naive commitment to the niceties of democratic participation despite the demands and disdain of Jana's infirm father. Funny and unforced, the film itself is democratic in spirit, tolerant of and engaged with all its characters; it's also, finally, a touching portrait of the mother-daughter bond.