Czech Film Center

Synopsis

In a faraway kingdom where the King goes out hunt, the Queen prays to Saint Kryšpína for a baby. Their life is empty, being deprived of the joy of a child. One day, the Queen decides to pay a visit to the Devil that dwells in a dilapidated mill nearby. She makes a pact with him, and soon a beautiful princess, Štěpánka, is born. She grows up joined at the hip wit Štěpán, the son of the Queen's maid, and the two eventually fall in love, at which point the secret pact with the Devil is revealed: the Princess is to become the Devil's bride on her 18th birthday. To thwart the promise, the King holds an engagement ball where Princess Štěpánka is to become betrothed to a prince from a foreign land. The Devil comes to the ball disguised as a handsome nobleman but Princess Štěpánka rejects him outright, and so he turns her into a black specter appearing each night on the castle terraces. Štěpán, her childhood protector and sweetheart, vows to free her, and thus the battle with Hell begins...