Tomorrow I’ll Wake Up and Scald Myself with Tea (1977)

 

100 Best Science Fiction Movies from Slant Magazine

#99: Tomorrow I’ll Wake Up and Scald Myself with Tea (1977)

 

 

“A thing is funny when—in some way that is not actually offensive or frightening—it upsets the established order. Every joke is a tiny revolution. If you had to define humor in a single phrase, you might define it as dignity sitting on a tin-tack. Whatever destroys dignity, and brings down the mighty from their seats, preferably with a bump, is funny. And the bigger the fall, the bigger the joke.”

--- George Orwell

 

Though I lack an encyclopedic knowledge of cinema from behind the Soviet’s Iron Curtain, I have watched, and admired, a fair amount. My next statement might be inadequately grounded, but it seems to me that during the decades of the Evil Empire, it was the Czechs who best knew how to tell a joke.

 

Take the above quote from the English writer. Somewhat before the fall of the Evil Empire, that phrase, “Every joke is a tiny Revolution,” would become more associated with Czechoslovakian Jan Kalina, an academic who may-or-may-not have been consciously-quoting Orwell, and received both notoriety and fame because he staged Cabaret Theater performances celebrating his Nation’s heavily-censored humor -- This got him jailed, then exiled, by the Tyrants who were not amused.

 

Given how he suffered, it’s probably fair to give him this undue credit. Also, given his sense of sarcasm, he probably would’ve found the mis-attribution the best-est part of the honorarium.

 

A little Czech history might demonstrate why they were funny, it is because they were betrayed and oppressed by basically everyone:

 

It was a Republic born of the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of WWI, first attempting Democracy in that far-distant time of 1918, an era that Democracy was tried often in new places and frequently failing. But in the early days of WWII, so early wasn’t even called WWII yet, the Germany’s Adolf Hitler, saying his goal was to reunite all German-speaking peoples, made Czechoslovakia his second major Invasion. Regarding his first, he’d been half-invited into Austria (1938 and Hitler’s actual home-country) but Czechoslovakia (later the same year) was a different thing all together; it was an undeniable act of Aggressive War, something recognized as a War Crime even before Genocide was.

 

The Austrian Invasion has a more-than-passing similarity to Putin’s Annexation of Crimea in 2014, and the Invasion of Czechoslovakia has a more-than-passing similarity to Putin’s on-going Invasion of Ukraine (which the former-Czechoslovakia borders) in 2022. Regarding Czechoslovakia, the unprepared West adopted a policy of Appeasement, allowing Hitler part of Czechoslovakia, hoping that they could adequately re-arm before Hitler made his next big move on his road to World Domination. This proved a mistake that has never been forgiven. Hitler used what he stole from the Czechs to buttress his War Industries, grabbed the rest of the country and then Invaded Poland in 1939 and that’s when WWII officially began even though it was already started raging. If we stood up in 1938, Hitler may have been stymied and WWII proper might have been avoided. In contrast, in 2022, the West decided to stand-strong with Ukraine, and maybe, because of that, we might dodge the bullet of WWIII, which would have even higher stakes.

 

The Czechs opposed the Nazis, but not all of them, and resistance proved futile. They couldn’t re-establish their Republic until after Hitler’s global defeat 1945. Even before the first day of the new Republic, foreign forces were threatening them again, and again the West was abandoning them, and soon again, some of their countrymen were siding with the foreigners. As Hitler’s Germany was crushed, USSR’s Joseph Stalin loomed large.

 

The Allies permitted the Communists to annex Czech territory as a reward for Stalin switching sides away from Hitler (he’d been allied with Hitler until Hitler betrayed him in 1941) and Czech land was handed over to Ukraine (which had already suffered one of the greatest Genocides in human history at the hands of Stalin, but we don’t talk about Stalin’s Genocides as much as Hitler’s because Hitler was a loser and Stalin was a winner).

 

Between 1945 and 1948, the newly reborn and Democratic Czechoslovakia was a mess. There was a cruel and largely successful Ethnic Cleansing of the German-speaking peoples in the multi-ethnic, multi-cultural country (I should say this Cleansing was not monstrous enough to be called a Genocide). There was also economic crisis. The President, who had been a Human-Rights Activist, progressively embraced a more Authoritarianism attitude as chaos raged around him. Finally, in 1948, he was over-thrown in a Soviet-backed coupe. Czechoslovakia was just a pawn in the early Cold War’s “Game of Thrones.” The USSR won in Czechoslovakia; the USA won in Italy.

 

In 1968 the Czech people rebelled against their Soviet oppressors during “Prague Spring.” They were quickly Invaded by the USSR and crushed. Anti-Communist USA didn’t lift a finger to defend their desire for Freedom and Democracy, but then we were transitioning between Presidents. The incoming USA President, Richard Nixon, soon overthrew a Democracy in Chile in favor of an unabashedly Fascist regime in 1973. It was a time when the USSR and USA were little-interested in demonstrating their stated ideals, only in who had the most pawns on their chess table at the lowest cost.

 

And that, it seems to me, is why the Czechs got so skilled at telling jokes, it was the only Revolution left open to them.

 

Which bring me to Czechoslovakian SF, which is of great significance in world literature. Karl Čapek coined the word “Robot” in the play “R.U.R.: Rossum's Universal Robots: Kolektivni Drama (1920), a Satire detailing the blowback of exploitation of the Working Classes. His novel, “War with the Newts” (1935), was similarly-themed (it might have been a disguised sequel) but on a grander scale, with the oppressed non-humans rebelling and in the latter, did so under the guidance of a “newt Hitler,” achieving World Domination in a novel published only three years before the real Hitler showed up at Čapek’s door.

 

Čapek survived the Nazis only to be censored by the Communists, and though long-lived and prolific, never wrote another SF novel. In general, Czech SF leaned heavily on the tiny Revolutions of Satire and, as a result, was frequently repressed by the Soviet Overlords.

 

Perhaps the greatest of all Czech Comedy films, “Closely Watched Trains” (1968), has no SF or Fantasy elements but is instructive here. It is set during WWII and Villains are the Nazis, but it made damned sure you knew that the Fascists were intended as a spoof on then-controlling Communist Bureaucrats.

 

Czech Comedy and SF both suffered increasing censorship after the 1968 Invasion and the grueling era that the Communists referred to as “Normalization.” The now legendary “Closely Watched Trans” came just before, and “Tomorrow I will Wake Up and Scald Myself with Tea” came just after, that era of extra-oppression. During the lean years, SF was regulated to Children’s Literature and TV, and by reputation (I’ve personally read/seen none of it) the kid’s stuff started getting increasing sophisticated and subversively adult, because the artists had nowhere else to go. I think I can reasonably argue that “Tomorrow I will…” one of the most complex Time-Paradox films ever made but also surprisingly open and friendly in its embrace of the hells of Probability, may have been influenced by the immediately prior era’s Children’s TV. It comes off feeling more like a USA Screwball Comedy of the 1930s than almost any other SF film I can think of.

 

Jump forward in time again, and the USSR starts to collapse and Czechoslovakia is Free and Democratic again in 1989. Sadly, Czechoslovakia didn’t stay a country very long, endemic corruption and long-seething resentments among the various groups made for insurmountable logger banks. In 1992, in an orderly and non-violent fashion, Czechoslovakia split into two separate nations: the Czech and Slovak Republics.

 

Even now, the region suffers economic strife and is treated with disdain by the West, though it is an increasingly popular tourist destination. The best (worst) demonstration of this disdain is USA Director Eli Roth’s indefensible Torture Porn franchise, “Hostel” (first film 2005). It’s little more than a White-on-White racist diatribe against the Czech Republic, wherein Roth was assisted by the Slovak Republic. It’s full of false histories, vile sadism, and notably filmed in the wrong country with the alleged natives speaking the wrong language.

 

Back to “Tomorrow I will …”

 

It’s more light-hearted than “Closely Watched Trains,” despite having a much higher body-count. Again, Nazis are the Villains but I suspect they are, again, stand-ins for the Communists more as the Nazis think their cruel devotion to an Ideology will correct the flaws of History. It is not set in Czechoslovakia at all, but mostly in a post-WWII Nazi-playground of a future Argentina of the mid 1990s (anyone else remember when that was actually the future?), with a fair amount also set in wartime Germany. It is focused on how arrogance is expressed though power. Western Decadence is also a clear target.

 

It's based on a short story by Writer Josef Nesvadba adapted by Director Jindřich Polák and Screenwriter Milos Macourek (Macourek had far more a Comedy background than Polák). Macourek included wilder twists than the original story, and this apparently, initially, annoyed Nesvadba, but he reversed himself when he saw the finished film.

 

The Real-World Nazis notoriously hiding in Argentina at the time this film was made would’ve been as old as the Actors who play them in the film, but as it is set in the Future, so they’d should’ve been much older still. In the script, they frequently brag about the benefits of an Anti-Aging Drug while passing older people on the street. Despite living the good life, wearing fashionable suits and living in apartments that most Czech (or citizens of the USA) could only dream of, they are still committed to re-fighting the long-lost WWII and having the Third Reich rise again. The film also features a powerful dish detergent than is sold over the counter but acts like a Weapon of Mass Destruction – this was introduced as a throw-away joke early in the film, but proved an essential plot-point near the end. Also, Time-Travel has been perfected and commercialized; though the Government has safeguards against its abuse, those safeguards are meaningless against the Super-Rich Nazis.

 

Our two main characters are Twins, Jan and Karel Bures (both played by Petr Kostka). Jan is a brilliant Engineer who designed the Space Ship/Time Machine while more charismatic Karel is that same machine’s Pilot. Karel is also an utter cad, cheating on his fiancé Eva (Zuzana Ondrouchová) seemingly with ever other woman in Buenos Aries, and given that he’s an Airline Pilot/Astronaut/Time Traveler, God knows how many women even farther afield. Karel is also taking bribes from the Nazis to facilitate their plans for World Domination. Another important plot point is that Jan is secretly in love with Eva.

 

This morning, Jan served Karel breakfast, one gets the impression he does this every morning. Then Jan scalds himself with tea, and so distracted fails to notice that Karel is choking to death on a roll.

 

Then Jan does maybe the only bold thing he’s done in his entire life, he assumes Karel’s identity, claims he is the one who died, and goes out to live his brother’s presumably happier life. Too bad that Jan doesn’t know about the Nazi plot that he is now a central player in.

 

Well, the saving the Reich part doesn’t go well. It’s not only Jan’s ignorance, the Plotters also give in incorrect coordinates, and they arrive in Germany three years too early. The Air/Space/Time company, Universum, is also at fault, putting some passengers on the wrong ship, and there’s also a luggage mix up. All this is quite fun, but after the intended Time Paradox falls apart, things get even crazier. The emerging complexities do not overwhelm because the visual and musical cues (Composed by Karel Sbovodo) are deftly executed, so the audience always knows where and when the Characters are during the ludicrous back-and-forth.

 

Oily Nazi Assassin, Rolf Kraus (Vladimír Mensík), tries to reverse the scheme’s failure, so the last forty minutes becomes a cat-and-mouse with the newly Heroic Jan, who wants to set things back as they are supposed to be, raise (most) of the people who just got killed under his watch from dead, and, maybe, find true love. The film has been compared to the later “Back to the Future; Part II” (1989) but it is unlikely that Director Robert Zemeckis, who co-wrote with Screenwriter Bob Gale, borrowed from this because there was little chance the filmmakers even saw it.

 

Though some Czech films had been Western Art-House favorites for decades and a few even made their way to TV (in addition to Closely Watched Trains there was the SF and Fantasy films of Karel Zeman, “The Fabulous World of Jules Verne” (1958), “The Fabulous Baron Munchausen” (1961), and this film’s Director, Polák’s, earlier “Ikarie XB 1” (1963) better known as “Voyage to the End of the Universe”). “Tomorrow I will …” received precious little attention back-in-the-day. But an odd thing happened in 1982: England had only three TV networks, and BB1 was clearly the most popular because it had the Sports Ccontracts. On January 16^th there was a rain-delay for a Football game (Soccer for us in the USA) and a lot of channel-switching. The other two channels had expected to lose the ratings wars so they presented two cheaply available SF film premiers, “Capricorn One” (1977) and this baby. Those that turned on BBC3 loved this movie and it developed a tiny Cult-following, but it wasn’t shown again in England, or virtually anywhere else in the West, until after the Cold War was done. After 1989, with Czechoslovakian Republic re-establishing and re-opening, it had all but disappeared even there and wasn’t available of VHS for those who went looking for it in that Country. Thankfully, it has enjoyed a revival since 2005-ish because of the Second Run and Criterion Distributors.

 

The feel is very much Mel Brooks but the complexity is greater. These are not fluffy, throw away SF ideas like Brooks’ “Spaceballs” (1987), this is real-SF in which Probability has consequences. It also lacked a Brooks’ budget, but the FX miniature effects by Jan Kalis, Milan Nejedy, and Jiri Rumler, were worthy of England’s Jerry Anderson who was at the top of his career during the 1970s. Costuming by Miroslava Smidova was even better than the FX.

 

The joy of the film starts with its title-sequence which, without engaging the plot, sets up the Time-Travel theme with News-Reel footage of the Real-World Hitler manically re-edited so that his rants made him look as if he dancing to the tune of Svoboda’s cheerful score, which applied synthesizers to the score at a time when few knew how to make them work.

 

The cast is near-flawless, Kosta is especially good. Probably the greatest challenge was playing Hitler, because of the Fuhrer’s distinct mustache anyone could play Hitler, but Actor Frantisek Vicena also had to play against the real images of the actual man. He was excellent, playing it totally straight in the middle of a farce, projecting both menace and pathetic-ness in the same gestures. Over-all, the casting is excellent, we can recognize at-a-glance other historical characters like Herman Goering and Joseph Goebbels (neither actor was credited).

 

Trailer (without subtitles, but it is still pretty clear what’s going on):

 

Zítra vstanu a opařím se čajem (1977) Original Trailer [FHD] - YouTube