The Valley Of The Bees (1967)

Made back-to-back with Marketa Lazarová, The Valley Of The Bees has long played second fiddle to its more well-known sibling in the portfolio of director František Vláčil, but for my money it is the superior piece.

While also set in the Middle Ages, it is far more lean and focussed than the meandering Marketa Lazarová, with better defined and more convincing characters and a stronger central narrative.

Having shown his displeasure with his father's marriage to a child bride - with a bat-laden wedding present - young Ondrej narrowly escapes death at his enraged father's hands and is then promptly packed off to join an Order Of Teutonic Knights.

After years of faithful service to the Order, living a life of spartan deprivation and devotion, Ondrej (Petr Cepek) finds his calling tested when he witnesses the ritual murder of a fellow fighting monk who tried to escape the Order.

Ondrej slips away, but is pursued by his best friend, Armin von Heide (Jan Kacer), who - while still fanatically loyal to the Order - believes Ondrej can be "saved".

He tracks the errant knight back to Czechoslovakia and soon finds him trying to barter with some peasants for a horse. Armin thinks he has convinced Ondrej to return with him, but Ondrej soon gives him the slip and eventually makes his way back to his father's castle.

However, things have changed at the castle. His father (a cameo from Zdenek Kryzánek, who was Captain Beer in Marketa Lazarová) has died, his step-mother is in mourning and the place is generally run down. Ondrej takes over and brings the estate back to life, as the mutual attraction between the young knight and his father's widow grows.

As the story builds towards the wedding of Ondrej and Lenora (Vera Galatíková) there is a sense of impending doom which escalates to a scene (that echoes Ondrej's arrival at this father's wedding all those years before) when Armin shows up - ostensibly to tell his friend that he is giving up the chase and returning home to the Order.

The Valley Of The Bees (aka Údolí Vcel) is a damning indictment of the brainwashing power of religious fanaticism with people committing horrendous acts because they believe it's what God wants them to do. But it is also a fascinating - and terrifying - insight into mindset and lives of the fighting monastic orders that were the backbone of The Crusades.

Vláčil employs a clever auditory trick with Ondrej's character - when he is away from home he "hears" the constant buzzing of his beloved bees which he raised in hives outside the castle.

Yet after he is home for a time he starts to hear the ocean waves that remind him of the castle where his holy order is based, next to the sea.

This heightens the character's sense of not belonging anywhere and adds strength to the final twist in the tale when Ondrej realises he must atone for what has happened in his life.

There are no great battle scenes in The Valley Of The Bees, but it is full of powerful character studies of various men who have given their lives over to the service of God and how they respond in different ways to challenging situations.

A D&D player looking for guidance on how to portray a paladin could do worse than study this enthralling 97-minute film - particularly Armin's unwavering conviction.