Both films adopt an unusually fragmented approach to their chosen subject matter, to the extent that often during their running time any perceivable central message is lost amongst a melee of set pieces and seemingly inconsequential details and characters. Knoflíkáři is an intricate montage of such details, a celebration of the everyday grind of life tinged by Zelenka's often bizarre sense of humour encompassing everything from suicide, to sexual deviance, to atomic holocaust, whilst Rok ďábla is a mock documentary that concerns itself with a popular Czech folk band and spontaneous human combustion. Such disparate topics appear mismatched without the context which Zelenka invests in them, and he is unrepentant at the apparent tenuousness of his links between them. Zelenka concerns himself with the portrayal of humanity within the framework of the surreal world that he has created, and it is here that we can see the first signs that these films are not the same as the mainstream Hollywood output.

Zelenka's approach to humour is hard to define, and it can certainly be disputed whether or not it truly is irony. The first definition given by the Chambers Concise Dictionary for `irony' is a `conveyance of meaning (generally satirical) by words whose literal meaning is the opposite, esp. words of praise used as a criticism or condemnation ', and despite the ludicrous nature of most situations portrayed within these films Zelenka maintains a constant and tangible affection for his subjects. The filmmaker himself stated, in an interview with Jan Velinger for Radio Prague, that `I try to feel compassion for my characters and I consider them unique people and unique human beings. That's what I want to feel about my characters, I want to know that he or she is unique. That was what made The Buttoners rather popular here, this belief that every small person is unique. The audience can identify with a guy that's really special but just like everybody else.' .

Even the most unsympathetic characters within the films are given a chance to display a degree of humanity, to the extent that the foul-mouthed American pilot responsible for dropping the atomic bomb on Hiroshima is resurrected during a schoolgirl seance in Knoflíkáři so that he can be given a chance to understand and acknowledge what he has done (`Those people didn't deserve to die, even if they were Japs'). This plea for forgiveness has the additional result of providing an opportunity of absolution for a doctor responsible for the deaths of two young people due to careless driving, similarly giving this character the chance to voice his regrets openly and without judgement. The subjects in both films are all too aware of their own failings, or if they are not they are given the chance to express how they have learnt from their experiences before the film is over. This is perhaps at odds with the 'everyday reality' that Zelenka is observing, in which much goes unsaid or unexpressed and people have the capacity to conceal their regrets from one another. In the worlds created in Knoflíkáři and Rok ďábla there is always a way of undoing one's actions and making amends, either to a camera (as in Rok ďábla) or through literal resurrection, as in Knoflikari. It remains to be seen whether this is intended to aid one's understanding of the inanities of life by bringing such issues out into the open and giving every character a platform on which to express themselves, or whether Zelenka is merely creating a false representation that exists as a tool for his own amusement.

Knoflíkáři is a film that is concerned more with its own structure than raising any pertinent issues, and Zelenka's adherence to his central design of creating associations between a number of seemingly unrelated topics is often so unsubtle as to damage the narrative. The suggestion can be made that there is no central point, that Knoflíkáři is simply a representation of the inanities of life, "a film as crazy as the whole of the twentieth century" . However, it is difficult to understand Zelenka's use of such a tight plot template if all he wished to display were a collection of random vignettes.

The fact that he sacrifices so much of the film's integrity at the end in order to maintain this template indicates that the director is following a very specific thread, and that the chaos he creates within the film is very carefully controlled. This approach does not lend itself well to aiding the film-goers' understanding of modern life if it is allowed to subvert every facet of the film and unfortunately Zelenka's predilection with deliberately trying to shock his audience interferes with the effect he is trying to create. Rather than allowing the audience member to create their own associations and explanations for the montage of oddity that he parades before them, Zelenka insists on telegraphing what he is doing in a manner which is both unsubtle and counter-productive. Similarly, Rok ďábla loses much of its impact through the inconsistent nature of its message, lurching between the separate worlds of pastiche and philosophical musings.

The dictionary also suggests the existence of another form of irony, that of `dramatic irony', described as `a condition in which one seems to be mocked by fate or by the facts; orig. the Socratic method of discussion by professing ignorance' and it is this that Zelenka makes use of in Knoflíkáři to provide a platform for his exploration of human inanity and `everyday reality', using of the deaths in Hiroshima and `Kokura Luck' to provide bookends to the film. Up until the final twenty minutes Zelenka maintains a tenuous grip on `everyday reality', ensuring that the various stories are linked in a manner which, though occasionally a little outlandish, is nevertheless rooted firmly in the fact that such things could happen.

The instances of multiple adultery in `The Taxi Driver' are definitely unlikely but within the context of the film the audience allows itself to be coerced into accepting that such things can happen in everyday life, and even the man who enjoys spitting onto trains in `Idiots' is entirely possible. It is when Zelenka cheats, and moves from the real world into that of the supernatural that his desire for dramatic irony ceases to aid the narrative and in fact virtually de-rails it. The resurrection of the American fighter pilot who bombed Hiroshima stretches Knoflikari's already liberal take on reality to breaking point, and results in the undermining of everything that has gone before it. The introduction of such a sensitive and serious subject into the film at such a late stage is handled in a clumsy manner, as if Zelenka feels that the film requires a deep, academic dénouement in order to justify itself as more than just entertainment.

Rather than implying his connections, and thereby inviting the audience to examine and draw their own conclusions, Zelenka's approach is almost didactic. The situations he creates are needlessly dissected by the participants themselves, and the parallels are clumsily staged. An example is the moment when the doctor who has killed two people answers the Hiroshima pilot's call for forgiveness. Zelenka makes it quite clear why the man chooses to offer forgiveness, but is keen to remove all suspense from the moment by never allowing the audience a moment of uncertainty as to what type of person could identify with the American. Had the audience been allowed to consider who was calling in to the radio station (by depicting the doctor purely as a voiceover) there would be a greater sense of satisfaction and understanding when his identity is revealed, if it is at all. By showing us a situation and providing an overt commentary as well, Zelenka greatly reduces the extent to which the audience connects with the issues raised.

This uneasy juxtaposition of the surreal depiction of reality with Zelenka's occasional departures into self-indulgence also causes problems with Rok Ďábla, but in this case the effect is much more pronounced. Whereas Knoflíkáři is a definite work of fiction, despite its references to the real world, Rok Ďábla styles itself as a form of mock documentary charting the career of a popular real-life Czech folk musician, Jaromír Nohavica, and his band Čechomor. Zelenka's blending of the real and the unreal is more extreme in this instance, as whilst the band itself exists in everyday reality, the representation within the film is largely fictitious. It is unclear as to whether what we see is intended to function as an actual account of the band`s progress, whether the entire exercise is an invention dreamt up by Zelenka and the band, or whether their are elements of both.

This in itself presents conflicts that cannot help but hinder any understanding on the part of the audience, and rather than acting as a means of expressing one`s hidden emotions or presenting society`s foibles as in Knoflikari, Zelenka's humour here is a patchwork of clever irony and crude visual humour that do not compliment each other. Rather than presenting any attempt at simplifying or analysing the film's subjects, Zelenka seems to intentionally mystify them, working outlandish themes encompassing angels, bizarre rituals and spontaneous human combustion into his narrative and creating associations between the real and the surreal, just as he has done in Knoflikáři. Much of Zelenka's humour stems from this technique of taking everyday situations and subverting them in this manner, although it cannot be said that this approach aids understanding, rather that everyday reality provides the audience with a frame of reference on the subjects, whether they are the stock caricatures of Knoflíkáři or the popular celebrities of Rok ďábla.

It is interesting to note that whereas in Knoflíkáři it is the director's injection of seriousness into an essentially comedic setting that unbalances the film, in Rok ďábla the complete opposite is true. By refusing to remain true to his central conceit, that of the documentary, and inserting gratuitous jokes that bear no relevance to his subject matter Zelenka sabotages his own film. Even the style of humour employed by Zelenka often seems at odds with itself, blending the dry irony of the `realistic' sections with occasional departures into visual slapstick which appear crude in the context. An example is the moment when, for no apparent reason, we see Nohavica standing on a hill playing an electric guitar attached to a gigantic amp which is nearly three times his size and looks as if it would be more suited to a cartoon. Whilst this may be amusing or insightful in the correct context, here it sticks out and again undermines the effectiveness of the other portions of the film. Knoflíkáři loses its power when it demands that we take a ridiculous situation seriously when we have been invited to laugh at more plausible events throughout its duration, whereas in Rok ďábla Zelenka fails to aid our understanding by his constant need to reassure himself that he isn't taking the thing seriously.

Knoflíkáři is a surreal film that tries to become a serious discussion far too late into its running time, whilst Rok ďábla's lack of consistency in the style of its humour prevents either from working, resulting in a far less effective platform for the philosophical issues that Zelenka is hoping to raise. There are undeniably moments when this is not the case - Nohavica's `mountain of drinking' theory is fascinating in its simplicity and relevance, and the ghosts that appear during the concerts are metaphorical enough so that they do not interfere with the narrative whilst still making the point that an individual's past is always with the individual, yet many of the nuances of Zelenka's writing are lost through his inconsistency.

Zelenka's reluctance to allow his characters to dissect themselves unconsciously prevents a harsher, more subtle form of irony from entering into Knoflíkáři , and any potential for irony within Rok ďábla is undermined by the director's love of blatantly `telegraphed' set-piece jokes that are so ridiculous as to undo the comic reality that allows for true irony. The clash of styles present in both these films is a tool with which Zelenka creates his idiosyncratic brand of humour, but it is a mistake to assume that because these films use modern life as a basis for their narrative, they have the depth or design to provide enlightenment. Zelenka uses his portrayal of society as a means of highlighting the odd subversions and strange phenomena he is fascinated by, rather than using these deviations to help his audience to better understand `everyday reality`.