Upon discovering his wife’s infidelity, a lawyer becomes a fixture at “Battalion”, a seedy bar in old Prague where he is embraced as a champion of society’s outcasts. This late silent film, presented with an outstanding new score by Kryštof Mařatka, is an early high-water mark for social-realist cinema, yet impressionistic in depicting its hero’s decline.

Digital print courtesy of the National Film Archive in Prague. Battalion is preceded by Aimless Walk (Alexander Hamid, 1930. 9 minutes) and is co-presented with the Melbourne Cinémathèque.