Valerie And Her Week Of Wonders |work| Jun 2026

The film is saturated with blood-drinking, but it’s rarely about fangs in the neck. The grandmother doesn't just drink blood; she drains youth, vitality, and innocence. She is a vampire of time, desperate to reclaim the beauty and sexuality that age has stolen. In this reading, Valerie’s entire journey is a war against being consumed—not just by literal vampires, but by adult expectations, sexual predators, and the inevitable decay of the body.

It is worth noting that Schallerová went on to lead a normal life, becoming a psychologist, and has spoken about the film with a sense of fondness and professionalism. Yet the ethical ambiguity remains a central part of the film’s legacy. It is a film that forces you to question your own reactions: Do you feel horror? Sympathy? Or something far more troubling? Valerie And Her Week Of Wonders

That changed in the 2010s, particularly when The Criterion Collection released a beautifully restored edition. Critic Michael Atkinson wrote that the film "reminds us that horror is not always a genre, but a dimension of consciousness." Suddenly, a new generation discovered its strange, pagan beauty. The film is saturated with blood-drinking, but it’s

The plot of Valerie and Her Week of Wonders is notoriously difficult to summarize, largely because it operates on the logic of a dream rather than the causality of a screenplay. The film follows Valerie (played by the ethereally beautiful Jaroslava Schallerová), a thirteen-year-old girl on the verge of puberty. The narrative spans roughly a week in her life, during which her provincial existence is upended by a series of supernatural and inexplicable events. In this reading, Valerie’s entire journey is a