''Atentát'' (English title: ''The Assassination'') is a 1964 black-and-white Czechoslovak

war film War film is a film genre concerned with warfare, typically about naval, air, or land battles, with combat scenes central to the drama. It has been strongly associated with the 20th century. The fateful nature of battle scenes means that wa ...

directed by

Jiří Sequens Jiří Sequens (23 April 1922 – 21 January 2008) was a Czech film director. Life Sequens was born in Brno. After the Second World War, he went to Moscow where he studied film techniques. When he returned to Czechoslovakia he worked for C ...

. The

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

story depicts events before and after the assassination of top

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

leader

Reinhard Heydrich Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich ( ; ; 7 March 1904 – 4 June 1942) was a high-ranking German SS and police official during the Nazi era and a principal architect of the Holocaust. He was chief of the Reich Security Main Office (inc ...

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

(''

Operation Anthropoid On 27 May 1942 in Prague, Reinhard Heydrichthe commander of the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA), acting governor of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, and a principal architect of the Holocaustwas attacked and wounded in an assassinatio ...

''). Czech historians have called the film the historically most accurate depiction of the events surrounding ''Operation Anthropoid''. The agents portrayed in the film are not referred to by their real names but by the historical cover names they assumed for the operation. For example, Jan Kubiš is called Otto Strnad.

Plot

On September 27, 1941,

, one of the most feared top officials of the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

, an architect of

the Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

and

Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and the ...

's possible successor, is appointed "Reichsprotektor" of

Bohemia and Moravia The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia; cs, Protektorát Čechy a Morava; its territory was called by the Nazis ("the rest of Czechia"). was a partially annexed territory of Nazi Germany established on 16 March 1939 following the German oc ...

. As a result of his brutality and oppression he is also called "The Butcher of Prague" or "The Blond Beast". In the UK, a squad of agents is selected and trained before parachuting into Czechoslovakia. The team operates in Prague and plans the attack for about six months. The mission,

, is executed in the capital on May 27, 1942 in an

ambush An ambush is a long-established military tactics, military tactic in which a combatant uses an advantage of concealment or the element of surprise to attack unsuspecting enemy combatants from concealed positions, such as among dense underbru ...

. It almost fails when one of their

Sten The STEN (or Sten gun) is a family of British submachine guns chambered in 9×19mm which were used extensively by British and Commonwealth forces throughout World War II and the Korean War. They had a simple design and very low production cost ...

guns jams, but Heydrich is severely wounded by a grenade. Heydrich eventually succumbs to his wounds and during the frenzied aftermath the German high command takes savage reprisals, including the massacre of 340 men, women and children of

Lidice Lidice (, german: Liditz) is a municipality and village in Kladno District in the Central Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 600 inhabitants. Lidice is built near the site of the previous village of the same name, which was com ...

and the razing of the village. The group is eventually betrayed by one of its members and they are cornered in a church crypt in Prague. In the gun-battle that follows all agents commit suicide.

Cast

Radoslav Brzobohatý Radoslav Brzobohatý (; 13 September 1932 – 12 September 2012) was a Czech film and television actor. Brzobohatý was born in Vrútky, Czechoslovakia. He appeared in many Czech TV shows, including ''30 Cases of Major Zeman'', ''Ulice'' an ...

– 1st Lt. Král (based on Adolf Opálka) *

Luděk Munzar Luděk Munzar (20 March 1933 in Nová Včelnice – 26 January 2019 in Modřany, Prague) was a Czech actor. He appeared in the Czech New Wave film '' The Joke'' (Jaromil Jireš, 1969) and starred in the film ''Poslední propadne peklu'' under d ...

– 1st Lt. Sedlák (based on Alfred Bartoš) * Ladislav Mrkvička – Serg. Vyskocil (based on

Jozef Gabčík Jozef Gabčík (; 8 April 1912 – 18 June 1942) was a Slovak soldier in the Czechoslovak Army involved in the Operation Anthropoid, the assassination of acting ''Reichsprotektor'' (Imperial-Protector) of Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, ...

) * Rudolf Jelínek – Serg. Strnad (based on

Jan Kubiš Jan Kubiš (24 June 1913 – 18 June 1942) was a Czech soldier, one of a team of Czechoslovak British-trained paratroopers sent to eliminate acting Reichsprotektor (Realm-Protector) of Bohemia and Moravia, SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heyd ...

) * Jiří Kodet – Serg. Tousek (based on

Josef Valčík Josef Valčík (; 2 November 1914 – 18 June 1942) was a Czechoslovak British-trained soldier and member of the Resistance in German-occupied Czechoslovakia who took part in the firefight during the aftermath of the assassination of Reinh ...

) * Harry Studt -

Wilhelm Canaris Wilhelm Franz Canaris (1 January 1887 – 9 April 1945) was a German admiral and the chief of the ''Abwehr'' (the German military-intelligence service) from 1935 to 1944. Canaris was initially a supporter of Adolf Hitler, and the Nazi re ...

* Josef Vinklář – Serg. Vrbas (based on

Karel Čurda Karel Čurda (10 October 1911 in Stará Hlína, today part of Třeboň – 29 April 1947 in Prague) was a Czech Nazi collaborator during World War II. Wartime activities A soldier of the Czechoslovak army in exile, Čurda was parachuted into t ...

)

Awards

4th Moscow International Film Festival The 4th Moscow International Film Festival was held from 5 to 20 July 1965. The Grand Prix was shared between the Soviet film ''War and Peace'' directed by Sergei Bondarchuk and the Hungarian film '' Twenty Hours'' directed by Zoltán Fábri. Ju ...

- Golden Prize. * 6th Thessaloniki Week of Greek Cinema - Honorable mention, foreign film out of competition.As ''Ο δήμιος της Πράγας''

Notes

References

External links