• Ostře sledované vlaky (Closely Watched Trains)

5/11/21 (Tues)

A 1966 Czech film by Jiří Menzel set in a small Czech town toward the end of the war. A teenager is hired as assistant dispatcher at the local station. His main hope is to do as little work as possible like his father, who retired from the position on a nice pension at 46. He has no interest in the war given the experience of his grandfather, a budding hypnotist who tried to spellbind German tanks into submission until they barreled right over him. The workers bide their time by taking care of the pigeons or trying to bed the not-unwilling women that show up throughout. The few trains that pass by this rural location are “closely watched trains” carrying ammunition for the German war effort, which holds little interest for the workers. A Nazi-sympathizing inspector makes an appearance on occasion to convince everyone that the increasing German retreats are in fact a sly strategy to fool the enemy (he himself leaves by driving his car in reverse back along the tracks).

The boy, having little else to do, starts naturally enough to take an interest in sex. His first real attempt with a cute conductor unfortunately goes awry when he fails to perform. Dejected, he tries to commit suicide by slitting his wrists in the bath. He is rescued, and the doctor tells him that the problem is simply premature ejaculation, advising him to think about soccer during his next encounter to ease the tension. For practice, the boy seeks the cooperation of the stationmaster’s wife, who is literally choking the chicken (well, stroking a goose’s neck), and another’s sister, but they understandably refuse.

Relief finally comes in the form of a beautiful member of the resistance, who has brought a bomb to use on the next Nazi freight train – giving them a “closely watched train” of their own. Just days before the worried boy is to meet his girlfriend for another try, the woman heroically solves his problem. He emerges with a smile on his face and the bomb in his hands. Unfortunately the Nazi inspector reappears just then to question the staff regarding station seals that have been found rubber stamped on the lower regions of a woman’s body (shown during an indescribable sex scene involving the insatiable station dispatcher). The boy manages to sneak out with the bomb, climb up the wires and drop it on the train. Unfortunately he is spotted by a gunner and shot to death, dropping onto the train himself. The massive explosion that follows turns him into an unwitting hero. History has a way of drawing us in, comedy turning in a moment to tragedy.

This wry picture of the Czech mentality was apparently part of a Czech New Wave of film during the brief Prague Spring, which was decisively stamped out just two years later when Soviet tanks rolled in. One fascinating touch was a brief glimpse of an anti-Soviet poster, which would have made perfect sense under Nazi occupation – but of course doubtless reflected the mindset among intellectuals (and the public) in the 1960s as well. That moment, maybe 3-4 seconds, was simply background as the boy is being carried out of the bath to the doctors after his suicide attempt. But surely it wasn’t accidental.

The cast was terrific. The boy’s requests to the women for help in “becoming a man” weren’t entirely convincing as presented here – no one is that innocent – but they fit the general theater of the absurd, with everyone playing their quirky roles utterly straight. This has been called a coming-of-age film, but I think that misses the point. It is similar in a way to the incredible The Shop on Main Street, another Czechoslovakian film just a year earlier that explores with humor the attempt to remain apolitical in a political world. A very fine film.