Un air de liberté

Although not properly bad, and despite having mostly a nice art direction and acting, the TV film is tepid, shallow and seems to endure much more time than it would be necessary (particularly considering there is not a deep approach). While the visual idea of linking each character to how he/she is perceived by political police (with typewriter lettering), and there is an adequate concern with actual Stalinist paranoia by the regime rulers and agents, the movie is not consistent in its portrayal of authoritarianism, and keeps a pro-capitalist (instead of specifically pro-democratic) bias, noticed in quotes such as "I want beautiful clothes" for a character who wants to emigrate to the United States. Script should have been much more sophisticated, without so much caricature, with more realistic characters. One does not need to make right-wing propaganda in order to portray the lack of civil and political rights in Czekoslovakia in the 50's.

The movie tries to present the intelectual atmosphere of Prague in the 50s through a series of histories of young people who enjoy jazz. The photography and Acting is surprisingly good, but the story lacks consistency and the script is weak. The young characters bond over their appreciation of music, and there's some innocent flirting, but the political police tries to collect information on them. However, most characters lack depth. The fear of prison and the betrayals to the secret police are superficial and unconvincing. The story is glued by statements of the reports of the secret police on the different personas and situations but the narrative balances between the comedy and drama.

Overall the movie is decent, but it doesn't justice to the subject.