The Hordubals

drama

Typology

feature

Czech title

Hordubalové

Runtime

112

Country

Czechoslovakia

Copyright

1937

Production year

1937

Language version

Czech

Director

Martin Frič

Screenplay

Karel Hašler, Karel Čapek

Synopsis

Juraj Hordubal returns after eight years from America, where he has made enough money for improvements on his farm. His daughter Hafie does not recognize him and even his wife Polana displays no visible joy at his return. Štěpán Manya has been a labourer on the farm for the whole of these years and people claim that he has become Polana's lover. Juraj refuses to listen to the accusations and believes that his wife's estrangement is only the result of the long period of loneliness. Nevertheless he fires Štěpán. Subsequently his wife shuts herself in the attic and stops taking an interest in the household. So that she will become conciliatory, Juraj brings Štěpán back after a while, but he publicly announces that he is Hafie's fiancé, which is not to the labourer's liking at all. In spite of everything Juraj stops by the notary's and in his will he bequeathes all his property to his wife. But on the way home he gets drenched and comes down with fever. In the morning the news spreads through the village that he has been killed. Suspicion is first to fall on Juraj's brother Michal, with whom Juraj has been feuding of late. Eventually the desperate Polana confesses in court that she and Štěpán killed her husband. As the doctor states, however, the severely ill Juraj was at that moment already in a deathly agony.