Zdeněk Hess
Known For & Full Filmography32 Titles
Drama Series - 2010, 16 episodes • as Ptáček
An outstanding performance featuring brilliant storytelling, high stakes drama, and unforgettable character arcs.
Drama Series - 2009, 16 episodes • Main Cast Role
Set in Czechoslovakia, the drama follows the lives of its characters against the backdrop of real historical events that shape their personal stories. To evoke period atmosphere, the series intersperses authentic clips from vintage Czechoslovak film newsreels, using their original commentaries or newly recorded historical voice-overs by Vladimír Fišer. A narrator, initially voiced by Vojtěch Kotek and later by Matěj Hádek, provides continuity and reflection, guiding viewers through changing times. Under the guidance of screenwriter Rudolf Merkner, each episode’s script weaves family and individual dramas into key moments of Czech and Slovak history: political shifts, cultural trends, and social transformations from the 1960s onward.
Drama Series - 1989, 16 episodes • Main Cast Role
An outstanding performance featuring brilliant storytelling, high stakes drama, and unforgettable character arcs.
Drama Series - 1980, 16 episodes • as (uncredited)
Arabela was a children's television series produced in Czechoslovakia which aired from 1979 to 1981. The series has 13 episodes and is in the Czech language.
Drama Series - 2014, 16 episodes • Main Cast Role
An outstanding performance featuring brilliant storytelling, high stakes drama, and unforgettable character arcs.
Drama Series - 1992, 16 episodes • Main Cast Role
An outstanding performance featuring brilliant storytelling, high stakes drama, and unforgettable character arcs.
Movie - 2007, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
Julie is a woman who seemingly has everything. A handsome husband, teenage daughter and a thriving, undemanding job as a translator and now even a new dream house ... But she also has a secret that is slowly changing her idyllic life...
Movie - 1975, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
The plot begins in the Soviet Union showing first efforts to establish the Czechoslovak legion in 1942. The film also shows the assassination of Heydrich and the subsequent annihilation of Lidice. The main topis of the film is battles with German troops for Sokolovo.
Movie - 1979, 2h 15m • as kupec
The opera lady singer Ema Destinnová is in all her splendor at the American stages. But in Europe there rages war and she decides to return home to Bohemia.
Movie - 1980, 2h 15m • as Soireé Guest
A remake of Vávra's 1948 atomic age thriller Krakatit. Engineer Prokop creates the devastating explosive “Krakatit” and soon confronts manipulative agents and imperialist conspiracies. Realizing his invention’s threat, he fights to prevent its misuse, risking everything to stop those who seek to exploit his epochal discovery.
Movie - 1977, 2h 15m • as Voice (voice)
On 20th of April 1945 the Soviet army launches its attack on Berlin. The end has come for Nazi Germany and Hitler decides to commit suicide. In Prague K.H. Frank (Nazi Secretary of State and Chief of police in the Protectorate of Bohemia a Moravia) discusses with his commanders how to transform the city into an impregnable fortress, but the Praguers do not intend to wait any longer. From the early hours of 4th of May people start assembling in the streets and tearing down German signs. On the next day, the 5th of May, the uprising begins.
Movie - 1972, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
The life of the famous French writer Alexander Dumas the Elder. Screenwriter Jaroslav Dietl did not hide his admiration for this literary giant, and in addition to the screenplay he also wrote a three-part TV play about Dumas (starring Vladimír Menšík). In Kachyn's film, Dumas played the father and son of the Štěpánková brothers, and it was a very difficult and difficult task for these young actors.
Movie - 2007, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
Three soldiers desert and take refuge in an ancient, crumbling castle where three veiled maidens welcome them with a sumptuous feast, on the sole condition that they neither lift a veil nor lay a hand on their hosts during the night. Only one, Jakub, keeps his vow and is rewarded by a freed princess and a magical token that grants him three extra lives.
Movie - 1975, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A communist agent, who has successfully caught on with the stupidly gullible American secret services, does not have it easy - he is threatened with exposal, but he still rescues a Czech scientist whom the evil imperialists wanted to kidnap. It was supposed to be a psychological portrait of an intelligence officer under intense stress, yet convinced of his truth...
Movie - 1978, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A film about a young sanitation worker who tries to prevent the pollution of a river, but pays the price...
Movie - 1971, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
Marek (Jirí Holý), formerly a driver of a long-distance lorry, has served his term for smuggling art works abroad and is released from jail. Years ago, he sacrificed himself and confessed his guilt on behalf of his companions - the drivers Krása, Jelínek, Hess and Novák from the Ministry of Culture who gave them tips. Marek finds Hess and tells him that now he expects the gang to compensate him for the wasted years of his life.
Movie - 1990, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A commemorative and essayistic meditative piece on the Prague quarter Libeň during the 1950s.
Movie - 1978, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A mail truck is robbed near the small town of Kostelec, during which the perpetrators steal CZK 2.5 million. The local police fail to solve the case. After some time, a young and capable lieutenant Charvát arrives from the Prague CID. While he is getting acquainted with the circumstances of the case and the evidence found, he makes friends with the handsome Květa, the daughter of the hostel manager Weisse. The complicated relationship that develops between the two lovers is in no way comparable to the complexity of the criminal case that brought Charvat to Kostelec. Things get even more complicated when someone murders Malásek, a local brawler and drunkard, with a shotgun. He is actually Květa's husband. And his death, according to Charvat, is connected to the mail robbery...
Movie - 1968, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
Getting into the popular music spotlight is not easy, as even an enthusiastic amateur, an overconfident young man whose singing career soon fails, will find out... A tantalising insight into the backstage of the entertainment industry, neither the musical passages nor the unexpectedly massive participation of the singing stars of the time succeeded.
Movie - 1975, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
In 1955, a detained agent feigns loss of memory, speech and hearing. According to his written statements, his name is Karel Neumann and he was born in Radhost...
Movie - 1979, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
Lucie Rýdlová is found dead at a destroyed car after a night accident. The seat position shows that she cannot have been driving, and the dissection proves that she had died about four hours after the accident. It is for sure that a timely medical assistance could have saved her life. A pretty young tennis player Lucie lived at her grandmother, because her parents had been working abroad. Criminalists found out that the girl was going out with the interpreter Valenta (Eduard Cupák), who was twenty years older than her, divorced and a bit egoistic man.
Movie - 1961, 2h 15m • as Gusta
People in Czechoslovakia perceive the events of February 1948 differently. This movie tells how they behave depending on their views, beliefs and character.
Movie - 1980, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
The future communist journalist Julius Fučík had a stimulating childhood and youth in a working-class environment, when his moral maturity was already showing. The authors of the film recall that the young Julek was a star of the suburban operetta scene, and in three episodes they depict him both in his early childhood and already at the gymnasium, when the outbreak of the World War shaped his determination.
Movie - 1971, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
The harsh reality of a home for abandoned children blends with episodes of youthful fantasy and slapstick comedy in this story of an orphan girl. Lucy's fondest wish is to find new parents and leave an orphanage. She befriends a man who can create doors from paint. He gives her a stuffed dog that magically comes alive when placed on the ground, and he and his wife end up adopting the little girl. After finding parents of her own, Lucy sets out through fantasy to find parents for her orphan friends. All of the people Lucy meet during her remarkable make believe wanderings end up taking children home.
Movie - 1973, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A psychological drama about a nurse and a seriously ill car racer and factory driver...
Movie - 1982, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A short film about Prague, Prague residents, and the beginning of the weekend.
Movie - 1993, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
This time, the eight-year-old girl must fight to keep her parents from turning the House of Horrors, which she received as a gift from her grandfather, the Viennese Czech Swoboda, into a family villa. Helping her are her old friends, with the help of a magical clockwork mannequin, the witch Bertha, the charming Elvira and Dr Caligari. She arranges for notary Weber to come from Vienna to check that the terms of the gift agreement have been kept and that the attraction is fit for purpose...
Movie - 1987, 2h 15m • as stavbyvedoucí
Jirka Horáček, a teenager living with his father on a Pilsen housing estate, spends his free time at discos with friends. One night he meets the confident blonde Eva, who is already involved with an older suitor, Cáfa, and also encounters the kind Jitka. Despite Jitka’s interest, Jirka becomes infatuated with Eva and tries to win her favor, all while his reckless pursuits strain his relationship with his impatient father.
Movie - 1980, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
Vera, wife of the plumber Simandl (Josef Somr), is found murdered in the cinema next to the IDOC (Information and Documentation) agency where she worked. Police captain Marha (Frantisek Nemec), who is leading the investigation, is informed by Simandl that on the day of the murder Vera promised to bring home fifty thousand crowns to buy a car. Marha's primary suspects are the three men working at the agency: deputy editor-in-chief Brandl (Jirí Pleskot) and editors Pernata (Eduard Cupák) and Remes (Ludek Munzar, and of course also Simandl.
Movie - 1979, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A psychological story about dissatisfied individuals who despise the stereotypes of others, but create their own. Kazan, a vagabond through life, and Viola, who always settles for the ideal, form a disparate pair who eventually find the one.
Movie - 1961, 2h 15m • Main Cast Role
A story about the uproar caused by the arrival of a new, young and, by local standards, too energetic zookeeper in a village JZD. Her name is Maya Četná and one evening she arrives like a tornado on a motorbike in the semi-truck of a typical Czech village. The chairman, leaving the next day for a long-term training, has no time to get to know the girl properly, so it's no wonder he can't help wondering when she returns.
Movie - 2003, 2h 15m • as (uncredited)
Autumn 1988. Renata is studying journalism. She lives with her jealous boyfriend Standa, whom she occasionally cheats on. She edits the school magazine and is perhaps a little more daring than the others, mainly because she doesn't want to be the daughter of her father, a bigwig at the Ministry of the Interior. But the situation is getting out of her hands—Renata's anti-regime mini-activities and her romance with dissident Holý are getting the attention of the STB. Her dad is worried about his career and maybe even convinced that he should disinherit her. Her relationship with Standa is getting complicated.