Pat & Mat: Playing Cards – in good quality!

Hello, all!

As I'm busy with professional and personal obligations (amongst others, I'm finishing my first book, which has nothing to do with animation), this blog has been on pause for a couple of years now. I sometimes get the bug to go back to it, but the fire quickly gets extinguished by all the other things waiting for their turn. However, sometimes life throws a curveball (or, dare I say, plays its card?) and stops you in your tracks. This is one of those cases. 

Here, for your viewing pleasure, is a pristine copy of the final Pat & Mat episode produced by aiF, Playing Cards (frequently known as Karty):

UPDATE: Unfortunately, my original YouTube channel got banned due to circumstances which were never justified or explained by YouTube. Therefore, I am linking the video forwarded by TymekGry (explained below).

What, how, and why?! These are probably some of the questions you are thinking about, but I'll try to, as briefly as possible, explain the story behind this post.

Exactly 10 days ago, this copy of the film was unveiled to the digital world by a Polish fan who goes by the handle TymekGry. He uploaded it to YouTube via another fan, and also notified me by writing several comments on this blog.

I did not approve those comments. For reasons explained below, my reaction was not astonishment, but rather circumspection. I had to consider the whole situation. Indeed, some days later, the video with the copy disappeared, perhaps never to be seen again?

Of course, this is not how the Internet works. Once it's out there, it's out there. There's no going back to the bunker. Indeed, with just a simple search you could find it even without this post. So, where do I come into all of this?

I was not surprised to see this copy of the film. I had seen it before, many a time, the first of which happened on August 21, 2020. That was the day I met with František Váša in Split. It was a strange time – the summer Split sun made the weather sweltering, and the city was bustling with tourists, but everything was a bit subdued due to COVID-19.

Our meeting was anything but subdued, however. I was really glad to meet a great animator and director of the series, while it also pleased him to meet such a superfan. We didn't have a chance to communicate much via email, so I was thrilled and ready to bombard him with questions. However, as soon as we sat down on the Pjaca square, Mr Váša reached into his bag and took out this:

You can imagine my excitement then! Váša's words were something along the lines of "This is something for you. It's from the original." Of course, I ran home as fast as I could and inserted the DVD into my computer (which is by now long out of use). Before pressing play, I invited my sister in to share this, for me, historic moment. The opening "New Door" intro rolled out in amazing quality, followed by a never-seen credits sequence, then the rest of the episode. The 12 minutes and 40 seconds whizzed through in a blur. Finally, I had seen the entirety of the so-called "missing" or "lost" episode.

The beautiful lettering, one of the last to be done on film

The digital copy of the episode was made from original materials, presumably the original negative. I don't know what the exact purpose was, but this happened many years ago. Judging from the files on the DVD, back in 2009.

Naturally, I wanted to share this with my fellow ajetologists, but it wasn't to be. When he handed me the DVD, Mr Váša also told me not to share it in the open. Lest some old spirits be disturbed. As you might remember, the film was a collateral victim of the conflict between several members of the aiF studio, which made it go extinct. These conflicts were escalated into years-long lawsuits, so there was no point to add fuel to the fire.

I alluded to why in the introduction to my published interview: "As you can imagine, aiF’s break-up was not the most idyllic of splits (on the contrary, lawsuits sprung up) and there is no point in possibly opening old wounds with certain people through my blog."

In the end, I shared this copy with only a handful of people, who were gracious enough to never spill the beans. One of them is an animation pen pal who lives in Texas. He showed it to some kids in a daycare centre he was working in. It was a bit of a silly prank – I joked that the film finally reached its target audience, the USA!

That was that. As agreed, I never made any suggestion that this copy existed, apart from a buried clue. My Pat & Mat filmography page has for years contained the full credits for the episode. Nobody thought of asking me where I got them from, though.

I have to admit I toyed with the idea of releasing the copy online, but I would never do such a thing without previously consulting the people who worked on it, thereby betraying their trust. 

That's how we get to 2024.

When Tymek put this online, he did it rashly, without consultation and by explicitly describing how he obtained it. The person who provided him with the copy did not expect the upload to happen. This is why they later requested its removal.

This is where I felt I had to step in. I had been in contact with the person (who, I should mention, is not the director) before, and we discussed the situation through several emails. The conclusion was the following: what's done cannot be undone. The film is now out there, and let the world enjoy it. However, this will have to be done anonymously. I politely call on Tymek and his pals to remove all the references to the person who sent the copy and how it happened. This is all they ask in return of giving you the episode. Thank you for all you have done.

There was only one thing left to do – have a quick chat with the director, František Váša. He gave his okay for the film to be presented here and beyond. If anything, it's his most singular take on the series (in spite of the fact that he was pressured to include many elements he did not intend to, like the voices). He, along with a crew of a handful of people, worked on it tirelessly for more than a year. 

This was, now, 26 years ago. It's nice that we can finally put the whole story to rest and enjoy the fruit of their labour in a proper way.

This whole story could have been handled a bit better, but feelings were hurt only briefly and now it's time to move on. And by that I mean, of course, that we should be seeing the older episodes in such good quality as well! Until some other time, ciao :)

František Váša interview (2020)

František Váša working on B. Pojar's Hiroshi

After a long pause, I'm today finally showing you something very interesting: my interview with František Váša!

What? How? When did this happen? Quite a long time from now, actually, August 21st, 2020. Some months before, I was able to reach Mr Váša by email (big thanks to Dan cz for help) and introduce him to the blog, which he very much enjoyed. He is often difficult to reach by email, though, so I was especially pleased to hear he would be visiting Split, my hometown! This was, in fact, nothing unusual. Dalmatia is often a summer destination for Czechs and his family is no exception. I had a chance to meet him and ask him what I wanted.

Our meeting took place almost in transit. Mr Váša had just arrived to Split and had a ferry to catch to the island of Vis, so we were able to talk only for less than an hour in Split’s center. Our exchanges were a bit comical; Mr Váša speaks little English – I understand Czech well but can only speak half-broken sentences with intrusive Croatian vocabulary. However, I came prepared with translated questions and they quickly set us off. I spent the next 50 or so minutes getting to talk about most of the stuff which went on in the aiF Studio with one of its leaders! In Czech, of course. It was, as you can imagine, an exhilarating experience, only compounded when I accompanied Mr Váša to the ferry, met his lovely wife (who speaks perfect English!) and then got to chat with an even bigger name in Czech stop motion animation, director Jiří Barta, who was also going to Vis! It was wonderful to meet all of them and, hopefully, this was just the first of our encounters. Very much a day to remember!

Still, the interview! I must apologize to my faithful readers for posting it very late, but the delay was caused by multiple factors, from troubles with faithfully translating certain remarks to lack of time, but also not being able to reach Mr Váša afterwards for months at a time. I should also mention that, per his request, I will not be sharing certain small portions of the interview. As you can imagine, aiF’s break-up was not the most idyllic of splits (on the contrary, lawsuits sprung up) and there is no point in possibly opening old wounds with certain people through my blog. I hope you can respect that, as I have. The majority of the story is still here, I can assure you.

Before continuing, I must again thank František Váša not only for agreeing to meet with me and answer my questions, but also for providing some images which have further enriched this post!

 

The interview

MP: How did you react when you first saw that there is a blog devoted to Pat and Mat?

FV: [laughs] Ha, I thought to myself, and forgive me, is it possible that somebody can show this much interest in Pat and Mat, is everything fine with that person? 

MP: Hahaha, well somebody must exist somewhere!

New sequence... from aiF!

Without further ado, please take a look at this:

What was that?! Well, I wouldn't know - I didn't know this short film even existed until today!

First of all, I have to give out a huge thank you to 이은석 (Eunsuk Lee - please correct your name if I butchered it), who uploaded this clip. You may have heard of him already - he also gave the world a chance to see Karty in 2014. This clip comes from the very same VHS that features Playing Cards as well. The dubbing is not by David Nykl (and Peter Alton) this time - Korean dubbers perform the voices this time, being as awkward and uninspired as on the dubs for the 49 episodes issued by aiF Asia. Here's an edited version by Rakso which removes the voices and subtitles as best as it can, giving a better aproximation of what the film should sound like (definitely not what it should look like - the interlacing and overall feel of the VHS tape ruining the animation quite a bit):

I think it's obvious that this segment was produced around the same time as Karty. To me, it looks like a trailer of sorts, maybe for the announced 52-episodes series. It could also be the opening of Karty, but I don't think that's the case as the segment is over a minute long, though the abrupt cut at the end does leave me pondering the possibility. While this short film shares many traits with Karty, I think an interesting difference between them is the really rapid pacing. Of course, the format dictates fast action, but everything seems to play out faster than I expect it to. Update August 17: From the most reliable of sources, the director himself, I have learned that this sequence was indeed intended to be the opening sequence of the 12-minute version of Karty.

Pat & Mat DVD by aiF Studio (1999)

My thanks for this post go out to Jürg Schaeppi of the Pat & Mat Fansite, who has enabled me to see this DVD for the first time.

There have been many Pat & Mat DVD releases over the years, but this one is probably the most interesting. It is also the first. In 1999, DMP (Digital Media Production) from Prague released a DVD with ten episodes produced by aiF Studio.

Here is the original press release posted by the DVD's manufacturer Digital Media Production, found on an old version of their defunct website that can be accessed through Wayback Machine. It came out in support of the DVD's premiere on DVD Hall '99 which was an event opened in Prague on October 4, 1999.

The most successful Czech puppet series was created between the seventies an nineties in aiF studio. It was created by popular Czech caricaturist Vladimír Jiránek, experienced director Lubomír Beneš and composer Petr Skoumal. Pat and Mat are neighbors. Their friendship is strengthened not only by their desires to always produce, do or repair something, but also by the awkwardness that makes everything go wrong. Luckily for them, there is no lack of humor and cleverness with which they always cope with their clumsiness.
The two-handymen grotesque is being introduced for the first time in DVD format. These are the episodes present: Billiards, Safe, Windsurfing, Biscuits, Model Builders, Paving Brick, Convertible, Parquetry, Cyclists and Pipe.
The DVD Pat and Mat can be ordered via DVDexpress for 790 CZK.

790 CZK feels quite a lot to me, but maybe it wasn't as expensive 20 years ago. However, in Jürg's words, it was indeed crazy expensive. A further stumbling block was that he had to order the DVD from a Czech company and wait a few weeks for it to arrive to Switzerland. It seems the DVD was never made available outside of Czechia, which is a real shame as it was envisioned as an international release. This is already evident from the cover, which has the episode titles in nine languages: Czech, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Russian, Polish and, finally, English - which we know is a market the studio was especially looking to break.

1999 was a very tough year for aiF. It was actually its last, as the studio oficially declared bankruptcy on August 24. If you already haven't, I would advise you to read my post about the episode Karty and the studio's bankruptcy before continuing. It can be found here. You read that correctly - the DVD came out a month and a half after its producer bankrupted. This makes me believe it was in production for a longer period of time. The shadow of Karty hangs over every corner of this release. Even on the cover you can notice the hammers-pliers wallpaper that appears on Mat's walls in the episode. Later, there's even explicit mention of it. However, let's see what this DVD had in store for us way back in that time. I have to say that is one of the more ambitious Czech releases of the series, which says a bit more about the ones that followed. A lot of effort was undoubtedly put in it.

The DVD opens with a lovely claymation reproduction of aiF's logo that I had never seen before. Maybe it also popped up in Karty, who knows. What follows then is the 1992-94 series intro, but with the title cards updated. Instead of me describing it further, Rakso 98, a friend of this blog, has made a tour of it with various menus shown. This is the intro (when you watch it, only one warning message plays):

aiF filmed clay logo

Unreleased episode Karty and the dissolution of aiF Studio

Introduction

Pat & Mat's history is full of great stories and tidbits. Marek Beneš, the current director of the series, often tells the story of how he went to a market in Iran while promoting the series there and stumbled upon a seller with unofficial Pat & Mat merchandise. The vendor repeatedly tried to assure him that Mat was in fact the one with the yellow shirt, completely unaware of who he was talking to. However, there is one story that captures the imagination of anyone who even superficially looks at the history of the series and it's the story of the would-be 50th episode of the series, Karty (or Playing Cards in English), a fully completed episode from 1998 which never officially saw the light of day. It is like one of the duo’s ridiculous inventions ― prepared, animated, completed and then never seen, making it completely dysfunctional. 

our heroes playing cards in the eponymous episode

Naturally, as soon as word got out to that this blog exists, a request to cover the history of the episode was requested. This text will cover the episode’s history and the dissolution of aiF Studio that produced it. But first, let’s take a closer look at the mythology built around this episode in the preceding years.

How did we get here? Info about the episode online

Karty’s existence would have probably been mostly unheard of before 2014 had it not been mentioned on the aiF Studio’s official website back in the day. According to the website, Karty was supposed to have been the first in a series of 52 new episodes which would also have been dubbed. This was an insanely ambitious project and would have taken several years to complete. However, the website, available to this day, but on a different address, also contained an important remark: the episode was not authorized for release or distribution. 

aiF Studio's mention of Karty

The Pat & Mat fansite, which served as the most informed website about the series during the early 2000s, also found the episode to be a complete mystery, except for the fact that two snippets of it could be seen on a Korean website. We’ll get to that later. 

Info about the episode on the fansite

The official website of the Patmat studio, opened in 2001 by Marek Beneš, ignored the episode’s existence completely, as it does to this day, which is given the episode’s status completely logical. This was how things remained until sometime around 2006 the website of the studio animation people uploaded these four screenshots of the episode.