Creating Alois Nebel

It was conceived in a grubby bar in Žižkov and has ended up being paraded around film festivals worldwide, bathed in acclaim from the likes of James Franco. Alois Nebel, a new Czech movie based on a graphic novel by Jaroslav Rudiš and Jaromír Švejdík, who goes by the name Jaromír 99, is already taking the world by storm before it has even been released in its native country.

Shot in a striking black-and-white film noir style, and filmed in rotoscope - a technique whereby live-action is rendered by animators, creating a cartoon or comic-book style - Alois Nebel could well prove to be the biggest Czech film export in recent history. The domestic buzz is already palpable, with promos springing up around the country and cinemas bracing themselves for an influx of franchise fans, eager to see how the book pans out on the big screen.

And yet Alois Nebel's is not an archetypal comic-book hero. The eponymous protagonist (played in the film by Miroslav Krobot) does not possess an invincibility shield or the ability to fly. Rather, he is a lonely train dispatcher who suffers from hallucinations of ghostly trains from the past that appear out of the fog and pull up outside the station. Certainly, Nebel is no Spiderman.

"The story was inspired by my grandfather, called Alois," Rudiš tells The Prague Post after returning from a screening of the movie at the Venice Film Festival, which was enthusiastically received by American actor James Franco, among others. "He worked on the tracks as a railway man, in Jeseník. He died in 1960, but there were lots of stories about him that my father and uncle told me."

Rudiš was in a bar in Prague 3 with artist and musician Jaromír 99 when the idea for the graphic novel fell into place. The drinking den was situated in such close proximity to the railway tracks that every time a train went by the walls shook. It was then that Rudiš knew how his grandfather's story could be told, and the two set to work.

"We create the story, write, sketch, we work in jumps," Jaromír 99 says. "It is a little bit punk, but it works."

Rudiš seems somewhat taken aback by the reaction to Alois Nebel, from its early stages as the 2003 graphic novel titled Bílý potok. "We were very surprised with its success," he says. "We saw it as an underground project, something for us and a few friends. It sold 7,500 copies, so we said 'OK, let's do some more.' "

Some more is exactly what they did. Following in the wake of Bílý potok came Hlavní nádraží and Zlaté Hory, both in 2004.

Yet even with the success of this trilogy, Rudiš was shocked to receive a call from production company Negativ, asking if they could make the movie. Rudiš agreed, on the proviso that the film was as close to the original graphic novel as possible; he and Jaromír 99 became an integral part of the movie's production.

"I participated in the scenario, in the songs that are in the movie, but above all I transformed the recorded material into my stylized art form, which animators used as a model," says Jaromír 99.

The creative duo, along with Negativ, signed up the talent of young director Tomáš Luňák, who had the idea to shoot the film in rotoscope. The process of bringing Alois Nebel to the big screen was a vast undertaking, no less than five years from start to finish.

Despite overnight international stardom and continuing invites to international film festivals in cities such as Tokyo and Thessaloniki, it is somewhat fitting that Alois Nebel will have its Czech premiere in the small town where it all began: Jeseník. Fans chose the town's Kino Pohoda as the preferred location.

Those who don't make it into this intimate screening will have to wait until Sept. 29, when Alois Nebel is released countrywide.

Meanwhile, the pair is already buzzing with new ideas. Although Jaromír 99 is now hoping to "stay firmly on the ground" and spend more time with his baby daughter, he plans to continue work on a new album with his band Umakart. Rudiš, meanwhile, is putting the finishing touches to a Czech-German black comedy screenplay, about army weapon fetishism, a concept the writer himself humorously claims is "incorrect."

And both are collaborating together again in the research stages for a new graphic novel telling the story of Sudetenland-born actor Rudolf Rittner, who starred in Fritz Lang's 1924 film Die Nibelungen.

Alois Nebel will be screened with English subtitles at Aero, Bio Oko and Světozor cinemas.

Will Noble can be reached at
wnoble@praguepost.com