Closely Watched Trains (The Criterion Collection)
by Jiri Menzel
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Actor: Alois Vachek, Josef Somr, Vaclav Neckar, Vladimír Valenta, Vlastimil BrodskýDirector: Jiri Menzel
Brand: Criterion
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Subtitled); Czech (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Black & White, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 93 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2001-09-18
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Criterion
DVD Reviews of Closely Watched Trains (The Criterion Collection)
DVD Review: What about your wife?
Summary: 5 Stars
A young Czech man named Milos Hrma begins work in a train station in Nazi occupied Czechoslovakia. His father retired from the same job and is now on paid retirement. Milos is very pleased to have a job that doesn't require hard work, and his mom is very proud that her son has been given an attractive uniform, the envy of the neighborhood.
At the station, the employees are more interested in romance than in work. There's a lot of sex going on during those slow hours in the night when few trains appear.
But our poor hero Milos is not part of the sex play. He is a virgin, and a very funny and naive one. There is a beautiful, sweet girl interested in him, but she doesn't know that he is a virgin and she is in for a disappointment during his first attempt. He's really not ready for her.
Meanwhile, his funny co-worker is having a ball. In one cute scene, the co-worker uses the official German stamp presses to decorate the body of a beautiful girl. In other words, he puts a few official stamp imprints on her butt and elsewhere.
I like one of the characters, a German fool who explains the troop movements in World War Two to the boys on the job. He describes all of the military setbacks as strategic withdrawals, pretending that his side is winning the war, even as the Allies roll back the German defense in Europe.
Near the end of the film, things get a bit political, yet still in a comedic way. There is a plan to sabotage an ammunition train, to blow up a trainload of German ammunition. The central characters in the plot are the Czech playboy with the stamper, our poor hero Milos (who is distressed at his inability to make love to a woman, to the point of suicide), and the other boys at the job.
A stunning young woman comes by with a bomb. She represents the Czech underground. She hears of Milos's problem and decides to take action. Leave it to a Czech undergrounder to solve the problem. She makes a happy man of him.
As a result, now that he is a man he is more than able to join the resistance to Nazi oppression.
The film has a powerful ending. It is really a wonderful story.
The only criticisms I have are that it starts a bit slow for me, not really picking up until the middle chapters, and that it is overly flattering to the Czech population, a bit self serving, as if every Czech male was happy to lay down his life for the chance at fighting the Germans, as if all of the Czechs were as kind and innocent as the characters in this story, without a hint of racial hatred in them. We know that to be false.
Czechoslovakia was caught up in the vicious antisemitism of most of Europe, so the people weren't as kind and funny and adorable as the characters in this film.
I almost hear the director saying "This is who we were, we were wonderful, innocent, funny people", and it simply wasn't true. Europe of the 1930s and 40s was a cesspool of hatred and prejudice, a land that could only be described as hellish and demonic, because the people themselves were that way, partly as a result of economic difficulties.
The strength of the movie is in its heart, and in its comedy.
One of my favorite moments is when poor Milos, who has already tried to kill himself because he thinks he will never be able to have sex like a normal man, is instructed to find an older woman to help him learn, and he asks a co-worker "What about your wife?" I could have fallen on the floor laughing. All he meant was that the man's wife might know someone, but it was so funny. And to keep the joke going, he later asks another friend "What about your sister?"
I happily give this film the highest rating of 5 stars.
Description of Closely Watched Trains (The Criterion Collection)
At a village railway station in occupied Czechoslovakia, a bumbling dispatcher's apprentice longs to liberate himself from his virginity. Oblivious to the war and the resistance that surrounds him, this young man embarks on a journey of sexual awakening and self-discovery, encountering a universe of frustration, eroticism, and adventure within his sleepy backwater depot. Wry and tender, Academy Award®-winning Closely Watched Trains is a masterpiece of human observation and one of the best-loved films of the Czech New Wave.Bestsellers in DVD
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