Sotva film skončí, diváci odejdou.

Here sotva means as soon as or hardly... when.

So Sotva film skončí, diváci odejdou means something like:

• As soon as the film ends, the audience will leave.
• Hardly will the film end before the audience leaves.
  (This second English version is more literal in feeling, but less natural in everyday English.)

A useful thing to know is that sotva can also mean barely / hardly in other contexts, so learners often find it confusing. In this sentence, though, it is a conjunction introducing an event that happens immediately before another one.

This is because Czech often uses present forms of perfective verbs to express the future.

In your sentence:

• skončí = from skončit (perfective)
• odejdou = from odejít (perfective)

Perfective verbs do not normally have a true present meaning. Their “present” forms usually refer to a completed event in the future.

So:

• film skončí = the film will end
• diváci odejdou = the audience will leave

This is very normal Czech grammar, even though it may feel strange to an English speaker.

This is about aspect.

Czech verbs often come in pairs:

• končit = imperfective, focusing on the process, repeated action, or ongoing ending
• skončit = perfective, focusing on the completed result: to end / to finish

Here the meaning is when the film has ended / once it ends completely, so Czech uses the perfective verb skončit.

Compare:

• Film končí. = The film is ending / is coming to an end.
• Film skončí v deset. = The film will end at ten.

In your sentence, the audience leaves after the ending is completed, so skončí is the right choice.

Again, this is aspect.

• odcházet = imperfective, to be leaving / to leave habitually
• odejít = perfective, to leave as a completed action

Because the sentence describes a single future action that will happen after the film ends, Czech uses the perfective odejdou.

Compare:

• Diváci odcházejí. = The audience are leaving. / The audience leave (regularly).
• Diváci odejdou. = The audience will leave.

So odejdou fits the idea of one completed future action.

Because Sotva film skončí is a subordinate clause, and Czech normally separates subordinate clauses with a comma.

Structure:

• Sotva film skončí, = subordinate clause
• diváci odejdou. = main clause

This is standard Czech punctuation.

A similar pattern:

• Když přijde, začneme. = When he comes, we’ll begin.
• Jakmile skončíme, odejdeme. = As soon as we finish, we’ll leave.

Film is in the nominative singular because it is the subject of skončí.

• film = the film
• skončí = will end

So literally: the film will end

Nothing special is happening to the noun here; it is simply the subject of the subordinate clause.

Diváci is nominative plural of divák, meaning spectator / viewer / audience member.

Here it means the audience in the sense of the people watching the film.

Grammatically:

• diváci = subject
• odejdou = will leave

So:

• diváci odejdou = the spectators will leave

English often uses singular the audience, but Czech commonly uses the plural diváci when focusing on the people as individuals.

Yes, it follows a very common pattern:

Sotva + clause, main clause

It expresses that one action happens immediately after another.

Examples:

• Sotva přijdu domů, zazvoní telefon.
  As soon as I get home, the phone rings / will ring.
• Sotva začalo pršet, běželi jsme dovnitř.
  As soon as it started raining, we ran inside.

So your sentence is a normal example of a broader structure.

Yes. Jakmile film skončí, diváci odejdou is also correct and very natural.

Both sotva and jakmile can mean as soon as, but the nuance is a bit different:

• jakmile = straightforward as soon as
• sotva = often slightly more literary or expressive, with a sense of hardly... when / immediately after

So:

• Jakmile film skončí, diváci odejdou. = neutral and very common
• Sotva film skončí, diváci odejdou. = also correct, a little more stylistically marked

Yes, and this is an important source of confusion.

For example:

• Sotva jsem ho poznal. = I barely recognized him.
• Mám sotva sto korun. = I have barely a hundred crowns.

But in your sentence, sotva is not an adverb meaning barely. It is functioning more like a conjunction: as soon as / hardly... when.

So the meaning depends on context.

The given word order is natural, but Czech word order is fairly flexible.

Standard version:

• Sotva film skončí, diváci odejdou.

You could also move the subordinate clause after the main clause:

• Diváci odejdou, sotva film skončí.

This is grammatically possible, but the original order sounds more natural if you want to emphasize the time relationship first.

Within the clauses, Czech word order can shift for emphasis, but the basic version you have is the clearest and most neutral.

A natural English explanation would be:

• As soon as the film ends, the audience will leave.

This helps an English speaker understand two things:

1. Czech uses perfective present forms where English often uses present + future:

   • film skončí = the film ends / will end
   • diváci odejdou = the audience will leave

2. Czech sotva here introduces an event that triggers the next one immediately.

So although the Czech grammar is different from English, the overall structure is very normal in Czech.