Atentát

Atentát (English title: The Assassination) is a 1964 black-and-white Czechoslovak war film directed by Jiří Sequens. The film depicts events before and after the World War II assassination of top German leader Reinhard Heydrich in Prague (Operation Anthropoid). Czech historians have called the film the historically most accurate depiction of the events surrounding Operation Anthropoid.^{[1][2][3] [note 1]}

Atentát
Movie poster
Directed by	Jiří Sequens
Written by	Miloslav Fábera Kamil Pixa Jiří Sequens
Starring	Radoslav Brzobohatý
Cinematography	Rudolf Milič
Edited by	Jan Chaloupek
Music by	Miloš Vacek
Distributed by	Ústřední půjčovna filmů
Release date	20 August 1964 (1964-08-20)
Running time	104 minutes
Country	Czechoslovakia
Languages	Czech German

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.^[5] For example, Jan Kubiš is called Otto Strnad.

Plot

On September 27, 1941, Reinhard Heydrich, one of the most feared top officials of the Nazi Party, an architect of the Holocaust and Hitler's possible successor, is appointed "Reichsprotektor" of Bohemia and Moravia. 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, Operation Anthropoid, is executed in the capital on May 27, 1942, in an ambush. It almost fails when one of their Sten guns jams, but Heydrich is severely wounded by a grenade. Heydrich eventually dies from 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 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 take their own lives.

Cast

• Radoslav Brzobohatý – 1st Lt. Král (based on Adolf Opálka)
• Luděk Munzar – 1st Lt. Sedlák (based on Alfred Bartoš)
• Ladislav Mrkvička – Serg. Vyskocil (based on Jozef Gabčík)
• Rudolf Jelínek – Serg. Strnad (based on Jan Kubiš)
• Jiří Kodet – Serg. Tousek (based on Josef Valčík)
• Harry Studt - Wilhelm Canaris
• Josef Vinklář – Serg. Vrbas (based on Karel Čurda)

Reception

Awards

• 4th Moscow International Film Festival - Golden Prize.^[5][6]
• 6th Thessaloniki Week of Greek Cinema - Honorable mention, foreign film out of competition.^{[5][7][note 2]}

See also

Related films

• Hangmen Also Die! (1943)
• Hitler's Madman (1943)
• The Silent Village (1943)
• Operation Daybreak (1975)
• Anthropoid (2016)
• The Man with the Iron Heart (2016)

Notes

1. Contemporary critic Kenneth Tynan described it as "conventional".^[4]
2. As Ο δήμιος της Πράγας