The Good Soldier Svejk

Mrs. Müllerová brings Švejk the news of the Archduke’s assassination. Švejk takes himself off to the U Kalicha pub, he philosophizes about Ferdinand and the detective Bretschneider arrests him. At the interrogation Švejk admits to all his “crimes” and, after a medical examination, is taken off to a psychiatric hospital from where they send him home as an imbecile. Soon Švejk is called up into the army. Mrs Müllerová takes him in a wheelchair to report at a recruiting station. The commission takes Švejk to be a malingerer. He is cured at a military hospital with enemas and a strict diet which he breaks thanks to the delicacies brought by the baroness von Botzenheim. Švejk serves as a batman for first lieutenant Lukáš for whom he steals a dog from a colonel. The colonel meets Lukáš with the dog and has him transferred to the march battalion. On the way to Budějovice by train Švejk first verbally assaults the major general who is traveling incognito and then he stops the train with the emergency alarm chord. He is detained and has to go to Budějovice on foot. In Putim the police takes Švejk for a Russian spy. After an up-country march Švejk reports in Budějovice to Lukáš and soon they depart to the front…