General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Empties

Empties (Czech: Vratné lahve) is a 2007 Czech comedy directed by Jan Svěrák, written by and starring his father Zdeněk Svěrák as Josef Tkaloun, a retired Czech-language teacher who takes a job at the returnable-bottles counter of a Prague supermarket. The film was produced by Eric Abraham and Jan Svěrák for Biograf Jan Svěrák and Portobello Productions with the Danish co-producer Phoenix Film Investments, and it had its gala Czech premiere on 7 March 2007 and its distribution premiere on 8 March 2007.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Original title	Vratné lahve; English title Empties²
Director / writer	Jan Svěrák (director); Zdeněk Svěrák (screenplay and lead role)¹
Countries / year	Czech Republic, United Kingdom, Denmark; produced 2006, copyright 2007¹^•²
Genre	Comedy, melancholy comedy²
Czech premiere	Gala premiere 7 March 2007 (Palace Cinemas Slovanský dům, Prague); distribution premiere 8 March 2007²
Czech box office	1,254,282 admissions and 124.3 million CZK per Union of Film Distributors data³
Major awards	Czech Lion 2008 for Best director and Best screenplay; Karlovy Vary 2007 Audience Award⁴^•⁵

Spoilers

Story

Josef Tkaloun, an aging Czech-language teacher at an elementary school, decides after one more classroom outburst, wringing a smelly sponge over a disobedient pupil's head, to quit teaching for good.⁶ He does not anticipate that leaving school also means leaving his place in society, and he finds himself isolated in his Žižkov flat with only his wife Eliška for company.¹

After a few unsuccessful attempts at dignified work, including a stint as an errand boy on a bicycle, he accepts a position at the window where a nearby supermarket buys back returnable glass.¹^•⁶ His energetic, communicative nature soon makes him part of the lives of the people who pass the window, and the small space becomes a warm counterpart to the sterile, consumer-oriented store around it.⁶ While he quietly helps customers and co-workers, including his daughter Helenka, find partners, his own long marriage suffers: Eliška feels she no longer attracts her husband, who flirts with other women.⁶ The Karlovy Vary festival synopsis adds that the couple's upcoming 40th wedding anniversary becomes the occasion for comic confrontations and a possible reconciliation.⁷

The Svěrák trilogy

Czech Film Center describes Empties as the last in a loose life trilogy by the father-and-son team: The Elementary School (Obecná škola, 1991) dealt with childhood, the Academy Award-winning Kolya (1996) with adulthood, and Empties with old age.¹ The films are linked thematically, not by plot or shared characters, and can be watched independently.⁸ Zdeněk Svěrák wrote himself into the lead role, as he had in the earlier collaborations, and the film's distribution slogan played on the pairing: "Zdeněk Svěrák & Jan Svěrák. For there to be a hello, there must first be a goodbye."²

The screenplay went through several versions. A documentary about Zdeněk Svěrák, Tatínek (2004), records that Jan Svěrák withdrew at the last minute from a long-planned shoot, and that his father then wrote a sixth version of the script with which Jan was satisfied.² One inspiration for the story was a real bottle-collection worker, though Tkaloun and his family are fictional.⁸

Production

Filming began on 13 March 2006 and ended in May 2006.² The crew included cinematographer Vladimír Smutný, editor Alois Fišárek, and composer Ondřej Soukup; the soundtrack includes the song "Ani k stáru" by Jaroslav Uhlíř with lyrics by Zdeněk Svěrák.¹^•⁴^•⁹ The film was shot in color on 35 mm with a 1.85:1 aspect ratio and Dolby Digital sound, with dialogue in Czech and German.²

The cast is led by Zdeněk Svěrák (Josef Tkaloun) and Daniela Kolářová (Eliška), who had previously played a couple in the comedy Na samotě u lesa; Tatiana Vilhelmová, now credited as Tatiana Dyková, plays the daughter Helenka, and Jiří Macháček plays deputy headmaster Landa.²^•⁶^•¹⁰ Excerpts from the telenovela Milagros were used in the film.¹¹

Reported running times differ by source: Czech Film Center lists 97 minutes, Česká televize 100 minutes, Filmový přehled 103 minutes, and the Karlovy Vary archive 104 minutes.¹^•⁶^•²^•⁷

Reception and box office

The film was a substantial domestic hit. By August 2007 Screen Daily reported that it had become the highest-grossing Czech film ever, earning $5.5 million on 1.1 million admissions since its 8 March premiere.¹² Final distributor-union figures record 1,254,282 admissions and 124.3 million CZK, equivalent to about 11.5 percent of the Czech population.³ A Ministry of Culture report on Czech cinematography places the film third among Czech films released from 1992 to 2009 by admissions, with 1,260,900 viewers and 124,626,861 CZK.¹³

Internationally, Screen Daily's reviewer Dan Fainaru, writing during the 2007 festival season, judged that the film looked poised for a career like Dark Blue World: strong business at home but modest international interest, and he found its overall effect sadder than its comedy label suggests.¹⁴ On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds a 100 percent Tomatometer from five reviews and an 82 percent audience score.¹⁵

Awards

At the 15th Czech Lion awards (for 2007, presented 2008), Jan Svěrák won Best director and Zdeněk Svěrák won Best screenplay, and the film won the audience-attendance Czech Lion; it was nominated for Best film, Best actress (Daniela Kolářová), Best actor (Zdeněk Svěrák), Best supporting actor (Pavel Landovský), cinematography, editing, sound, and poster design.⁴ The film won the Audience Award at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 2007, where it screened in Official Selection Competition, and Zdeněk Svěrák won Best actor in the EurAsia competition at the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2007.⁵^•⁷ Other festival honors include an Audience Award at the Ljubljana International Film Festival 2007, an Audience Award at the Cottbus Film Festival of Young East European Cinema 2007, a Special Jury Mention for the screenplay at Karlovy Vary 2007, and a Gold Dolphin for Best Film at the Festroia International Film Festival 2008.¹⁶

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Comedy and romantic films (individual works) › Comedies of 2007 to 2008 › Released in 2007

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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