The classic literary work of Scottish novelist Robert Louis Stevenson novel spurred screenwriters to script this adventure movie by transferring a storyline to the Bulgarian city of Varna, on the Black Sea. Vrak (Shipwreck), a coproduction with Bulgarian filmmakers, takes the audience back to the year of 1908. The main character is a young Czech man, František Roučka. While in the employment of his father’s schoolmate Schuman, he witnesses the ruthless scheming of a Greek ship owner. Roučka goes on to discover that the owner of the shipwrecked Apolonia has handed over Bulgarian patriots to the Turks. The Bulgarians have thus paid the ultimate price for their attempt to return to home soil… Director Ivo Toman cast David Vejražka in the role of the uncompromising Roučka. An interesting aspect of this 1983 film is the casting of Olga Schoberová. The role of Schuman’s wife Klára would be her last appearance on the silver screen.
It is 1908. A young man from Prague, named Frantiek Roučka, arrives in the Bulgarian city of Varna to launch his business career there on his father's wish and under his former schoolmate Helmut Schuman. Helmut ranks amongst the respected entrepreneurs in Varna. He learns from the newspaper about the foundering of the Greek ship Apolonia which was transporting leather to the value of twenty thousand Leva. The two friends decide to buy the shipwreck. But visiting the Apolonia's captain, named Nikos, who behaves very oddly, makes them feel that the ship was carrying something much more valuable than leather. Attorney Berger, however, shows up at the auction, driving the price up to seventy thousand Leva and, in negotiation, even offers Helmut and Frantiek one hundred thousand Leva to surrender the shipwreck to him. The two men refuse. They find out during their next visit to Nikos that the captain has been murdered. They thus hire a boat with a crew and Frantiek sets off to the shipwreck. He does not trust anybody because unpredictible things keep happening on the hired boat. They eventually reach the shipwreck, finding no gold but corpses hidden under the leathers. One of the sailors, named Janis, tells them about the horrifying events that occurred on the ship. The dead men are the Bulgarians who were escaping from Turkey, but as soon as they paid the ship's owner, he sold them back to the Turks. Captain Nikos protested against this practice. The Bulgarians were killed right away, then Nikos later, on dry land. The two friends find out after their return that the man behind the crimes was doctor Feldek, an esteemed businessman. Helmut accepts a bribe from him for his silence, but Frantiek is firmly resolved to contribute to the culprit's punishment.
František Roučka
obchodník Helmut Schuman
Klára, Helmutova žena
kapitán Nastev
Nikos, kapitán lodi Apolonie
loďmistr Neuerburg
advokát Berger
námořník Janis
námořník Pečkov
kormidelník Koster
námořník Max
obchodník Danailov
dr. Feldek
Reichen
starý sluha
člen správní rady Kokinis
fotograf
číšník
kuchař Nassie
muž ve vestě
recepční
člen správní rady
turecký voják
turecký voják
turecký voják
námořník
námořník
mladá žena
pravoslavný kněz
vyvolávač Kasatonov
hospodský Trajko
dubl Nikose
hlas Helmuta
hlas Kláry
hlas kapitána Nasteva
hlas Nikose
hlas Janise
hlas Pečkova
hlas Kostera
hlas Maxe
hlas Feldeka
hlas kuchaře
hlas vyvolávače
Josef Loučím, Radost Račeva
Aleš Voverka, Helena Kadlecová, Vasja Panova, Nikolaj Bosilkov
Robert Louis Stevenson (Vrak /The Wrecker/ – román)
Kovář Oldřich (kamera)
Todorka Bistrekova, Karel Kracík, Miloš Sršeň, Milan Šefrna
František Čížek, Miroslav Buhr, Bogdanka Karajanova, Vlasta Hájková, Julia Sisakova
Rudolf Mos, Miladin Ivanov, Hana Štefanová
Přemysl Čermák
Renata Čihulková, Růžena Hejsková, Helena Lehovcová, Petr Pištěk, Zdenek Sirový, Orlin Nedelčev, Alena Červená
Vrak
Shipwreck
Tajnata na Apolonija
film
feature
adventure, historical
Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria
1983
1983
1 June 1984
long
84 min
Czech