The Girl on the Broomstick

Václav Vorlíček's 1972 Czechoslovak film brings a young witch, frozen in time for three hundred years as a punishment at her school, into the present. Saxana escapes and finds herself in a modern town inside an ordinary secondary school; she knows magic but nothing at all about the rules of the world she has landed in. The film draws a brisk comedy out of that contrast, with spells cast in class, in the canteen and in the street producing a new disaster every time. The effects are built with the means of the period and a hand-made inventiveness that now carries a nostalgic charm. It took a permanent place in Czech popular culture, and the character has been known across generations. Who it's for: viewers who like classic Eastern European children's films and fantasy comedy. Who it's not for: anyone expecting modern effects and pace; the film moves at the rhythm of its own era.