Taking Stock

Famous and popular handymen Pat and Mat, who have secured a place in the hearts of several generations, celebrate their 40th birthday this year. And Pat and Mat: The Film is their gift.
The pilot episode of a series called “Tinkers” was made in 1976. It was directed by the talented director Lubomir Beneš who collaborated with Vladimir Jiranek, a graphic artist with a unique style. Clumsy handymen who, much to their satisfaction, always come up with an impossible solution to a problem, were later named Pat and Mat and the series was named “…and that’s it!” Its short slapstick-like episodes are characteristic with their original humour, exaggeration and irony, so Pat and Mat became instant favourites of children and parents alike. Furthermore, this series is an example of excellent and precise puppet animation. In the course of time, many filmmakers collaborated on this series, for example Vlasta Pospišilova, the first lady of Czech animation.
This time, Pat and Mat take on a vicious cactus, a dried up tree and decide to “upgrade” their home with original improvements. And since we are in the 21st century and everyone promotes a healthy lifestyle, our handymen will try to get in shape on a stationary bicycle.

The second instalment of the Hotel Transylvania has the enterprising Dracula family go through another set of adventures. Dracula finally gives up his strict rule of accommodating only monsters in his hotel and opens it to human guests. But behind the closed door of his crypt, Dracula is consumed by doubts as to whether his half-human half-vampire grandson Dennis will ever become a vampire. So when Mavis and Johnny go to visit the human half of the family tree – which is also full of surprises – grandpa “Drac” asks his friends Frank, Murray, Wayne and Griffin for help and together they prepare to train Dennis to become a monster. But they have no idea that Drac’s grumpy and very, very, very old-fashioned father Vlad wants to pay his family a visit. So when Vlad finds out that his great-grandson is not a pure-blooded vampire and, on top of all things, humans are allowed to the hotel, all hell breaks loose.
Director Genndy Tartakovsky once again used computer animation to the fullest and animated even the tiniest details, which means we can see the full scale of the characters’ movements and scary, funny, sad and all other sorts of facial expressions. The film’s approachable stylization of the slightly macabre world of “nice” vampires will be appreciated especially by children.

Have you ever wondered why the little, yellow, cute and cuddly Minions willingly serve Gru, a villain with a capital V? You will find the answer to this question right at the beginning of this film, which maps the evolution of the Minions. Just imagine that from time immemorial these do-gooders by nature have seen the sense of their existence in serving the biggest villain in the world. And every time they lost their master through a series of unfortunate events often triggered by the Minions themselves, they immediately started looking for a new one. And this went on for centuries.