Closely Watched Trains - Criterion Collection (1966)

A Beautiful Film

Note to American viewers: "Closely Watched Trains" (1966) is one of them "fereign films". It has subtitles and is in black and white (actually a strength as it is superb film stock). The setting is German-occupied Czechoslovakia during WWII. The setting and the use of the Czech resistance movement (to the German occupation) as a plot element may confuse Americans; many of who believe that Czechoslovakia was an Axis country or have never given the subject any thought. But just prior to the start of the war, Britain and France sold out Czechoslovakia. They backed out of their treaties and allowed Hitler to break up the country; establishing the German Protectorates of Bohemia and Moravia and annexing the Sudentenland (which had a significant German population). During the war Czechs served in both the Axis forces and in armed internal movements resisting the German occupation. Also useful in understanding the film was a revisionist trend by European countries in the 1960's to rehabilitate their images; suppressing any record of cooperation/assistance to Germany while proclaiming their resistance to the Nazi agenda. The film is a product of this trend which is why the resistance elements seem rather tenuously inserted into the story.

The film revolves around young Milos Hrma (Vaclav Neckar) who follows his father's example and goes to work for the railroad; becoming an apprentice dispatcher at a rural station. The impressionable Milos becomes fascinated with Hubicka, a veteran train dispatcher who devotes most of his energy to various on-the-job seductions. The second act involves Hubicka's on-going conflict with their superior, the pigeon-raising and feather covered stationmaster.

But "Watched Trains" is really Milos' coming of age story, complete with the requisite line: "you mean this is the first time you have been with a woman". Milos' first time proves a disaster and leads to an unsuccessful suicide attempt.

Meanwhile, it turns out that Hubicka has more on his mind than girls. He is a member of this resistance and is planning to destroy a German munitions train when it passes near the station. Unfortunately for Milos, Hubicka's recreational activities are reported to the authorities and he must attend an investigatory hearing inside the station, scheduled for the same time that the ammunition train is expected. Milos, who has finally demonstrated his manhood in bed, must now demonstrate it my climbing the signal tower and dropping an explosive device onto the train as it passes beneath.

The film goes out with a bang and one is left to decide on the relative merits of the two methods young men have of proving their manhood.

I forgot to mention that the film is actually a comedy. And for that matter the whole thing about the resistance movement is pretty much a side story to the coming of age stuff. And the female characters are all a little too good.

As tends to happen with good little movies, the plot has very little to do with what the movie is about, and nothing to do with the effect it had on me. And as tends to happen with them "fereign" films there are allegorical elements. The characters are seen from Milos' innocent point of view, a nontraditional hero who is neither heroic nor particularly intelligent. But he does fall in love and that reshapes his destiny.

All in all a very entertaining production. Especially good is Jitka Zelenohorská as a female telegraph operator, who becomes the object of Hubicka's playful attentions.

Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child. November 12, 2007

Very Nice

A very simple story about a young boy called Milos who is on the verge of breaking into adulthood and living through the usual adolescent problems. He lands a job a small train station in rural Czechoslovakia. The station is manned by a middle aged station master who spends his time feeding his flock of pigeons and wistfully helping his wife weave woolen sweaters. The station master's main train dispatcher Josef, who is a smart, but flirty Josef. Josef is a silent rebel, with a nonchalant air of defiance around him.
Josef takes Milos under his wings educating him about dispatching trains and the art of impressing girlfriends effortlessly. The story meanders around slowly. Josef disobeying the station master, romancing the countess and other women in the station (to the chagrin of the station master). Milos on the other hand is struggling with the usual adolescent problems whilst learning to send telegraph messages, dispatching trains and timidly attempting to date Jitka (a train conductress). His first date and first kiss doesn't go too well, so he attempts suicide and is then counseled by a rather stern area commander who believes that the Nazi forces (occupying and ruling Czechoslovakia at the time) will salvage them and show them the way.

Amidst and beneath this rather simple story is anther subtle, undercurrent story of Nazi occupation, their ideals and brutalities. Josef's nonchalance is a metaphor for the subterfuge & rebellion against the occupation. One day, the area commander visits the small station and tells them about an explosives-laden "closely watched train" that will pass by the station the following day. Josef immediately hatches plan to blow it up. Gorgeous Victoria brings a neatly packaged time-bomb (hinting at the efficient undercover rebel movement) and the unsuspecting Milos volunteers to plant it on the "closely watched train" with childlike innocence. The next day, the area commander arrives at the station just minutes before the train is supposed to and threatens to sabotage Josef's plan, but young Milos acts smartly, sneaks with the time-bomb, changes the train's track, scampers up the signal post and drops it on one of the train bogies. But, he loses his balance and falls on the train. Minutes later, bomb explodes with ferocious intensity & shaking everybody with a powerful shockwave. Josef relishes the stirred air, fellow villagers & townspeople seem contend and the area commander is stunned. Milos has (in his usual unsuspecting ways) become a martyr and graduated into adulthood.

The movie has been directed wonderfully. Two very different stories have been mixed with effortless ease. It is essentially a comedy movie with serious patriotic underpinnings. The cinematography is perfect. Here are some salient points:
1. Milos running after a slowly moving train whilst Jitka is waving at him from the last compartment. Milos can't keep up and fades into the distance.
2. Numerous shots of a passing train blow dust & sand as Milos gives it salute with full attention and the nonchalant Josef whispering something into his air with his cap sideways cap and disheveled hair.
3. Josef and others being swept away by the shockwave of the train explosion, holding onto their caps and smiling with utter content.


July 22, 2007

Oh, those randy Czechs!

The "Closely Watched Trains" are those that are carrying supplies to the German army in and through occupied Czechoslovakia during World War II. That is why they are closely watched--so that they run on time. But they are also closely watched by the people of Czechoslovakia, especially dispatcher Hubicka (Josef Somr) and his trainee Milos Hrma (Vaclav Neckar) for another reason, which will become apparent as the movie ends.

Not that Milos and Hubicka are especially diligent workers. On the contrary. What Hubicka is especially adept at is seduction of females while Milos is distracted by his worries about becoming a man. He has what must be seen as a problem demanding comic relief (if you will). He has trouble pleasing his girl friend because of premature ejaculation. He is so consumed by this embarrassing failure that he seeks quietus in the warm bath of a bordello. Meanwhile Hubicka is able to please the pretty young telegraphist Virginia Svata (Jitka Zelenohorska) by playing a kind of strip poker with her and rubber stamping her pretty legs and butt much to her delight and to the consternation of her mother when she finds out. The German Councilor Zednicek (Vlastimil Brodsky) who tolerates no hanky-panky when it comes to keeping the trains moving conducts an investigation and comes to the conclusion that Hubicka is guilty of misuse and abuse of the great German language because he stamped German words onto Virginia's body!

This is the tone of the film, wryly ironic, irreverent and mildly comedic, employing in a sense a kind of off-center "theater of the absurd" treatment. Director Jiri Menzel, who appears briefly in the film as Dr. Brabec who diagnoses Milos's "affliction," spun this off from a novel by Bohumil Hrabal, but it could easily have come from a novel by Jaroslav Hasek, who wrote the celebrated Czech classic, "The Good Soldier Svejk," so alike in treatment and tone are they, and so very characteristic of the Czech national mind-set vis-a-vis all the horrors of the European wars. Menzel concentrates on the petty affairs of day-to-day peasant life, sex, the raising of pigeons and geese, the boredom of bureaucratic jobs as he works toward the culminating scene in which the heroics seem almost light-hearted and to come about more from happenstance than from careful planning.

Some of the scenes in the movie are absolutely unique in the world of cinema and suggest a kind of cinematic genius. The creepy goose-stuffing (for foie gras pate) scene in which Milos seeks help with his "problem" from an older woman is riotous--or would be riotous if we were not so amazed as what she is doing while talking to him and what it LOOKS like she might be doing! The scene in which Stationmaster Lanska is torn between the prospect of seducing a voluptuous woman and the chance that he might miss supper reminded me of a little boy at play with his mother calling him home for dinner. The final scene in which it looks like Menzel may have employed a wind machine is just so perfectly presented, combining as it does the stark realism of the war and a delicious (but soon to be mixed) personal triumph of the resistence.

This is one of the classic films of all time. But prepare to put aside ordinary viewing habits and to concentrate with an alert mind. The subtleties of Menzel's little masterpiece will be obscured by inattention, preconceptions and faulty expectations. (Or at least that is what they'll tell you at film school.)

See this Oscar winner (Best Foreign Film, 1967) for Jiri Menzel who survived oppression and censorship by the Soviets and is still making movies. March 31, 2007

Superb

Based on an outstanding short novel by the Czech writer Bohumil Hrabal, Closely Watched Trains is probably the finest film of the Czech New Wave. The New Wave resulted from a period of experimentation that resulted from the liberalization of the Communist Party that produced the Prague Spring and was terminated by the Soviet invasion. The wit and humor with which Closely Watched Trains approaches Czech life during WWII was undoubtedly a major departure from the conventional party ideology. As commented by other reviewers, Closely Watched Trains is a witty sex comedy and ironic coming of age story. It is also a deeply ironic allegorical account of Czech history during WWII. Superbly filmed and acted. July 17, 2006

A Funny Train from Somewhere Sad

A funny look at a dramatic world through the eyes of railway workers in a small town in wartime Czechoslovakia. I enjoyed watching this movie, it really is a hopeful and humorous story about human beings in times of turmoil. This is Czechoslovakia during World War II. The Nazis are officially in control, and actively imposing their bureaucracy on the nation. Our protagonist is young Milos Hrma, whose father is a retired railway man, and spends the day sitting at home, looking at his watch, and telling everyone where each train in now. He encourages his son to find employment at the local village railway depot.

Easily the youngest employee at the depot, Milos wants to fit in, be admired, be a man. He wears the uniform of a train dispatcher, but doesn't seem comfortable in it yet. While other reviewers have mentioned young Milos' talk of wanting to have sex, which is actually quite funny in its stark honesty, much can be lost in our descriptions. This is a comedy, not a prurient display. It seems that sex is simply the path Milos believes he must take to be a man. It is his naivety and honesty with his fellow railway employees that makes the whole deal such a riot. This self-created drama keeps his mind off of what is happening around him. Some may be offended by this, in which case I'd suggest you'd probably be happier buying a Thomas the Tank Engine DVD. Milos does show himself a man...and it has little to do with s-e-x. Very worth watching!

Some of the scenes are terrific--I liked the scene where Milos goes up to kiss the female conductor as the train is about to pull away and then...oh, I won't ruin it for you! It really is a funny film set in a heartbreaking time. All the more interesting that it was shot in 1966. Reccommended for comedy buffs and railway workers everywhere. I wish that sort of exitement happened on my train! :) June 14, 2006

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