Smoke on the Potato Fields

The film opens with a parting at an airport abroad, where middle‑aged Dr. Meluzin Rudolf Hrušínský says goodbye to his wife as he returns to his native Czechoslovakia, hoping to find a sense of self that seems to slip away upstairs in memory while she stays behind in exile. Back home, he takes a job as a primary care physician at a health center in the small village of Větrov, and he is assigned a modest room in an apartment owned by the center that he must share with the young couple known as Kodet Alois Švehlík. The transition is not easy: the villagers are wary of the new doctor, and he himself is unsure of his place among them.

His first patient is an old man who bolts from the exam when asked to undress, and the nurse working with him seems dismayed by his insistence on keeping careful medical records. Meluzin comes across as cool and brusque, even disapproving when the ambulance driver takes him on a detour to visit the driver’s girlfriend, a vivid young woman named Markéta Zitová. On a walk to the cemetery, Meluzin meets the village sexton, who jokingly calls him a “colleague,” and he grows closer to his neighbor Pavla Kodetová Věra Galatíková, a schoolteacher who lights a fire for him in the Franklin stove and invites him into her kitchen for lívance, a memory that reminds him of his mother’s bilberry pancakes from his own childhood. The affectionate moment softens the newcomer, even as Pavla’s husband Petr Kodet, who is somewhat younger than Pavla, remains wary and suspicious.

Petr eventually confides a sorrowful truth: he and Pavla have struggled to have a child. Meluzin declines to examine Pavla himself, suggesting instead that she see a specialist and, perhaps to protect a fragile, growing attraction, hints that Petr should also be checked for fertility. The news unsettles Petr, who storms away from his wife, adding strain to an already complicated life in the village.

As Meluzin gradually wins more acceptance, his diagnostic skill begins to show in practical ways: he identifies a congenital defect in a co‑worker’s young son and oversees an operation that cures the boy. His personal life becomes entangled with Markéta again, the ambulance driver’s girlfriend who is pregnant. Markéta asks Meluzin for an abortion, which he declines, and he becomes a stabilizing presence as Markéta’s mother—an eccentric woman who has retreated from society because of a government road plan that would cut through her duck farm and home—turns increasingly hostile. Markéta’s mother, Markéta Zitová’s parent, is played by Nina Popelíková, and Meluzin helps to shelter Markéta by arranging for her to stay with Pavla when needed. The doctor quietly relocates himself to keep up appearances, aware of the gossip his new life might draw.

In the sixth month of Markéta’s pregnancy, Meluzin recognizes the risks to both mother and child and arranges for Markéta to go to a maternity hospital in a nearby city. Yet Markéta, craving the company of someone familiar, returns to Větrov on foot during a storm. Pavla, surprised to find her in pain, summons a nurse, and Meluzin arrives as Markéta delivers a healthy baby girl. But Markéta’s own condition deteriorates, and the crew in the village ambulance fights against a failing windshield wiper while racing through the storm to reach the city hospital, only to fail to save her in time.

The film closes on a quiet, hopeful note: in a coda, Meluzin discovers Petr Kodet driving a bulldozer on a highway project that threatens Markéta’s mother’s home. He persuades Petr to return to his wife, and in a future shaped by loss and responsibility, Petr and Pavla decide to adopt Markéta’s daughter, ensuring a new family bond takes root in the village.

Last Updated: October 07, 2025 at 08:47