Karel Roden Movies

A wannabe chef and an unrepentant womanizer team up to start a detective agency, and quickly realize they've gotten in over their heads when their first job lands them smack in the middle of a massive government conspiracy. Anthony and his best friend, Julian, have yet to live up to their full potential. When Anthony realizes he's never going to become a five-star chef and Julian grows weary of playing the constant lothario, the two lifelong pals turn to sleuthing to make ends meet. Their first client is a smoldering top-dollar escort with evidence of a high-profile cover-up. At first they do their best to keep control of the situation, but when a shady U.S. senator comes knocking, the mob shows up guns blazing, and a most unusual assassin gets them locked in her sights, the only way to survive is to run like the devil and never look back. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

This Czech-language period saga from director Petr Nikolaev unfurls in the medieval era, during the initial gestations of knighthood. Nikolaev dramatizes the severe punishment of all acts deemed criminal, following analysis by the king's royal investigator and judge. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels director Guy Ritchie heads back to the London underworld for this hyperkinetic crime comedy concerning a shady land deal that leaves every schemer in the city determined to get rich or die trying. When a Russian mobster orchestrates a lucrative real estate scam, every criminal in London wants a piece of the action. Greed is the universal language, and everyone from unrelenting crime boss Lenny Cole (Tom Wilkinson) to street-smart criminal One Two (Gerard Butler), corrupt accountant Stella (Thandie Newton), and unpredictable punk rocker Johnny Quid (Toby Kebbell) seem to speak it fluently. As the bullets start to fly and the double crosses multiply, there's no telling who will walk away with the fortune after the gun smoke has cleared. Jeremy Piven, Chris "Ludacris" Bridges, and Quantum of Solace Bond girl Gemma Arterton co-star. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

An adopted girl returns to her homeland of Russia to explore the dilapidated mountain farm she has recently inherited, only to discover that it harbors a deadly secret in the feature debut from Aftermath director Nacho Cerdà. Shortly after the mysterious death of her birth mother, young Marie was adopted and brought to live in the United States. When Marie receives word that she has inherited an isolated farm in her native Russia, she soon sets out to explore the vast estate and peel away the thick gauze obscuring her secret-shrouded past. Confounded by the local's refusal to show her to the "damned" locale and determined not to give up after coming this far, Marie convinces a man to take her there only to discover that he has inexplicably vanished shortly after arrival. As Marie sets out to explore the ominous and expansive property alone, a surprise encounter with a man named Boris, who claims to have been lured to the house under similar circumstances, sets into motion a chilling series of events in which the ghosts of the past -- as well as deceased doppelgangers of both Marie and Boris -- prevent the frightened pair from leaving. In the terrifying hours that follow, both of these tormented lost souls will find that sometimes the past is best left forgotten. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Val Kilmer stars as the corpse of a wanted man in this western exploring the greed and iniquity of the lawless frontier. When a stranger rides into a small town toting the lifeless body of a noted outlaw, his intentions are to collect the bounty and be on his way. But the situation becomes complicated when the stranger sits down for a high-stakes card game with the drunken sheriff. With nothing to wager but the body he arrived with, the stranger calls the sheriff's bluff and goes all in. Later, despite the fact that he lost the game, the stranger vows to keep the corpse at all costs. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

His wife left flattened by a falling statue as the couple make their way through Eastern Europe on holiday, a grieving British tourist attempts to stage an early reunion with his beloved departed to little avail in director Steen Agro's pitch black comedy. When Colin's (Andy Nyman) wife Maggie (Klára Low) meets an untimely demise under a particularly unstable statue, the pain of his loss is too powerful to bear. After failing to snuff it by taking an electric bath, Colin meets hen-pecked handyman Pavel (Karel Roden) - a pushover whose high-maintenance wife has forced him to accept a series of odd jobs just to keep up with department store payments. Pavel has been assigned the task of driving Colin to the morge so that the visiting Brit can claim his wife's ashes, but Colin quickly offers his wheelman a large sum of money if he will simply end his suffering in the most painless manner possible. Unfortunately death doesn't come as easy for some as it does for others, and as the hapless pair become caught-up in the criminal exploits of hulking hoodlum Karel (Robert Polo) it begins to appear as if the suicidal widower may be death proof. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

The second chapter in the "Bourne Trilogy," based on Robert Ludlum's best-selling espionage novels, reaches the screen in this sequel to the 2002 thriller The Bourne Identity. Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) has abandoned his life as a CIA assassin and has been traveling beneath the agency's radar, eventually reconnecting with Marie Kreutz (Franka Potente), the woman he loves. But Bourne is haunted by vivid dreams and troubling memories of his days as a killer, and he's not certain how much really happened and how much is a product of his imagination. When Bourne is led out of hiding by circumstances beyond his control, he must reconcile his past and present as he struggles to keep Marie out of harm's way and foil an international incident with dangerous consequences. The Bourne Supremacy also features Joan Allen as one of Bourne's superiors, while Julia Stiles and Brian Cox reprise their roles as intelligence agents from the first film. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A monk and a pickpocket become unlikely allies in this action adventure story. Sixty years ago, a nameless monk (Chow Yun-Fat) was appointed the guardian of a mysterious scroll that grants remarkable powers to those who possess it. After six decades of traveling the world to protect the scroll, the monk must find someone new to assume the responsibility, but as fate would have it, the new caretaker turns out to be Kar (Seann William Scott), a scruffy and distinctly non-enlightened petty thief living in San Francisco. As the monk attempts to educate Kar in the powers and responsibilities of the scroll and the ways of a monk's life, they discover they have a rival for the possession of the valuable scroll. As Kar and the monk fend off their mysterious adversary, they are aided by Bad Girl (Jaime King), a beautiful Russian mob affiliate with amazing martial arts skills and a vested interest in keeping the scroll in virtuous hands. Bulletproof Monk was based a comic book series published in 1999; Chow Yun-Fat's frequent collaborators John Woo and Terence Chang produced. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Four years after scoring a box-office touchdown with Blade (1998), actor Wesley Snipes returns to portray the Marvel Comics character again in this sequel that teams him with Mexican horror director Guillermo del Toro. A half-vampire, half-human hybrid, Blade (Snipes) is a merciless vampire hunter bent on destroying the bloodsuckers that feed on humanity. The keys to Blade's success are a serum that allows him to resist the urge for blood and an array of inventive, deadly weapons, both of which were once supplied by his mentor, Whistler (Kris Kristofferson). Since Whistler's death, Blade has relocated to Prague and recruited the pot-smoking slacker Scud (Norman Reedus) to take the place of his father figure, but then he discovers that Whistler's not dead after all: He's been infected with the vampire virus. Reunited with Whistler, Blade is dealt an even bigger surprise: His greatest enemy, vampire leader Damaskinos (Thomas Kretschmann), wants to make peace with him. It seems that the vampires are facing a greater threat than Blade and hope to persuade him to fight the Reapers, a mutated super-race of vampires on a rampage of murder, indiscriminately killing both humans and their fellow bloodsuckers while sucking their victims dry. Blade agrees to a truce and joins the Bloodpack, an elite squad of commandos originally formed to fight Blade himself. Soon, the vampire soldiers discover that the virus responsible for creating their enemies is spreading rapidly and can be traced back to a mysterious "Patient Zero." Blade 2 (2002) co-stars Ron Perlman, Leonor Varela, Donnie Yen, and Matt Schulze. ~ Karl Williams, Rovi

An action drama centering on the media circus, 15 Minutes focuses on a New York homicide detective named Eddie Flemming (Robert De Niro), a famous figure known for his heroic on-the-job manner. A tabloid news anchor (Kelsey Grammer) attempts to get the scoop on Flemming's latest beat when a pair of Eastern European criminals (Karel Roden and Oleg Taktarov) find a way to manipulate the media by filming their exploits, which they believe they can sell to bloodthirsty journalists and make themselves rich. In the wake of a double murder, Flemming teams up with Jordy Warsaw (Edward Burns), an arson investigator assigned to help locate the murderous pair. Meanwhile, Flemming must contend with his news reporter girlfriend Nicolette (Melina Kanakaredes) as he and Jordy find themselves enveloped in a lurid series of events that threatens to jeopardize their safety. Kim Cattrall, Avery Brooks, and Vera Farmiga are also featured in the cast. ~ Jason Clark, Rovi

French producer Joel Farges got together with Czech producer/director Artemio Benki and four other young Czech filmmakers to contribute to a series of 20-minute episodes about love in the magical city of Prague at the end of the millennium. Praha ocima was inspired by episode films about cities, such as New York Stories by Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola and Woody Allen; but most of all by Six in Paris made by Claude Chabrol, Eric Rohmer, Jean-Luc Godard, and others. Not all of the five directors of the film come from Prague and their styles are certainly diverse. But they all have an affinity with the city, which is a meeting place of many cultures. Artemio Benki's Riziko (Dive), about a French couple whose relationship ends because, in Prague, she falls in love with a Czech, is narrated in a poetic style. Martin Sulik's Obrazky z vyletu (Pictures from a Trip) narrates the tribulations of a Slovak mother, an aging music teacher who has to accept her daughter's way of life in Prague. Petr Vaclav's bitter but nonetheless romantic Vikend V Praze (Weekend in Prague) is about a Chinese student visiting the city who realizes that her relationship with her French lover is over. Michaela Pavlatova's Absolutni Laska (Absolute Love) re-enacts the affair of two ex-lovers. Vladimir Michalek's Karty jsou Rozdany (The Cards are Dealt) is the bizarre story of a reporter who gets depressed every time he goes to a bar but cannot stop going. The common themes of the stories are the complications of love affairs, tragi-comic barriers to communication, the ingenious ways lovers bridge distances and generally the strange behavior of couples in love. Through the theme of love, Praha ocima also reflects the general welfare of the city's inhabitants. The film was screened at the 1999 Rotterdam International Film Festival. ~ Gönül Dönmez-Colin, Rovi