Customer Reviews

Closely Watched Trains [VHS]

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I remember seeing this film as a teenager when it first came out and have loved it ever since. I've also seen it about forty times and, like the wonderful book you read over and over, this film continues to be a revelation. It is darkly comic, wonderfully well drawn and has, to my mind probaby the single sexiest scene ever put on film (the famous "rubber stamp" sequence).

The real tragedy of this film however, is the director Jiri Menzel, whose many films have never seen the light of day in this country. A victim of the Soviet crackdown on Czechoslovakia in 1968, Menzel's follow-up film, the absurd and outrageously funny "Larks On A String" was banned until only a few years ago when it was briefly shown in the U.S. and had an even briefer run on VHS (hint-hint: a DVD please??). Clearly, Menzel was/is a genius whose gift was stopped in its tracks by the ugly spectre of politics.

Menzel, like his fellow film makers Milos Forman, and Ivan Passar has a unique and important voice. "Closely Watched Trains" is a masterpiece in its richness of character and observation on the human condition. There is not a single false moment, nor badly cast character in the entire film. It is a rewarding experience and one to savor over and over again. I don't know how many films can make that claim, but this is one film I will see for a very long time to come. I'm so glad the DVD has finally come out - I've worn out three VHS copies over the years.

The misadventures of a fledgling male, confronting the adult world for the first time, become a dark comedy about lost innocence and transitory accomplishments. The young hero, Milos, assumes the responsibility of his first job as a stationmaster's assistant in a village outside Prague. He is a frightened faun of a youth, all eyes and knobby knees, settling into the routines of a railway employee's life, and seldom removing his cherished cap, even in bed. The comic balance between Milos's shyness in both love and business matters, and the satirical look at small-town ribaldry, hypocrisy, and isolationism is overshadowed by the presence of the Germans. (It is the 1940s.) Menzel's film is a second look, filled with wit and pathos, at a particular Czech Everyman, catching every nuance of Milos's bright, often painful revelations, and leaving the spectator stunned by the inevitability of an unexpected fate.

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.

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, spending his days sitting at home, looking at his watch, and telling everyone where each train is 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! :)

This wonderful film from 1966 is one of the first black comedies, albiet with more pathos then you normally find in such fare. Director Jiri Mezel's film is set during the Second World War in a tiny Czech train when a young dispatcher (Vaclav Neckar) observes everything about life. Few black comedies cover so much, from the absurd to the erotic, with love and death thrown in, not to mention an ending that is still pretty shocking. "Closely Watched Trains" is an audacious film, especially for the time and place. Eastern Europe is not where you normally expect to find a jewel, but then the "Nazis" do not necessarily have to represent the Nazis, right? Again, this is one of the best black comedies you are going to come across in any language.

This is the most delicate, beautiful, transcendant film that I have seen. There is a dark, persistant humor that pervades this tale of a young man's self and sexual discovery during world war two. But the internal meaning and references include so much more. From the juxtaposition of images to the development of the protagonist, there is a subtlety, an expressive magic that seems to crown Czech films from the first and second generation of FAMU graduates. If you have any chance to see a 35mm print of this film, take it.

I remember seeing this film as a teenager when it first came out and have loved it ever since. I've also seen it about forty times and, like the wonderful book you read over and over, this film continues to be a revelation. It is darkly comic, wonderfully well drawn and has, to my mind probaby the single sexiest scene ever put on film (the famous "rubber stamp" sequence).

The real tragedy of this film however, is the director Jiri Menzel, whose many films have never seen the light of day in this country. A victim of the Soviet crackdown on Czechoslovakia in 1968, Menzel's follow-up film, the absurd and outrageously funny "Larks On A String" was banned until only a few years ago when it was briefly shown in the U.S. and had an even briefer run on VHS (hint-hint: a DVD please??). Clearly, Menzel was/is a genius whose gift was stopped in its tracks by the ugly spectre of politics.

Menzel, like his fellow film makers Milos Forman, and Ivan Passar has a unique and important voice. "Closely Watched Trains" is a masterpiece in its richness of character and observation on the human condition. There is not a single false moment, nor badly cast character in the entire film. It is a rewarding experience and one to savor over and over again. I don't know how many films can make that claim, but this is one film I will see for a very long time to come. I'm so glad the DVD has finally come out - I've worn out three VHS copies over the years.

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.

Set in Czechoslovakia in the 40s during the German occupation, Jiri Menzel's "CLOSELY WATCHED TRAINS" is a wry satire that helped establish the Czech New Wave.

Milos (Vaclav Neckar) is a virginal, naive, teenage apprentice railway depot platform guard in a village outside Prague. He is preoccupied with wishing for sex. He considers, and is even attracted to, joining the Resistance but that would require serious effort. So he spends his time doing as little as possible and flirting with the female conductor of a passing train.

This dark comedy is also a wonderful coming of age story in which the loss of innocence naturally parallels the greater losses in the increasingly mad world Milos inhabits.

Small town misadventures and petty rivalries are suddenly forced into a new perspective with the indomitable presence of the Germans and the surprising but inevitable hand of destiny. This is a comedy about Everyman enjoying his little realm of freedom and the System that eventually devoured it.

In some ways, this film has renewed meaning in our rapidly shrinking world where we question old beliefs and increasingly welcome the surrender of cherished Freedoms for the illusion of greater Security. Difficult issues that great films can clarify -- and obfuscate.

This film was my introduction to Eastern European cinema and I was quite pleasantly surprised. Closely Watched Trains is a terrific coming of age story with plenty of humor thrown in along the way. On a deeper level, it expresses the problems with the Soviet occupation of the Czech republic after WWII. Thank goodness the censors weren't paying attention, or else we might never have had the chance to see this wonderful film. The image quality is excellent on this DVD transfer - there is hardly any grain and the film is wonderfully shot. I found myself empathizing with Milos by the end of the movie, and you will too!