240 - Closely Watched Trains, 1966, Czechoslovakia. Dir. Jiri Menzel.

Monday, August 28, 2017

240 - Closely Watched Trains, 1966, Czechoslovakia.  Dir. Jiri Menzel.

What is a closely watched train?

During the German occupation of Czechoslovakia during World War II, German military trains had priority.

Local Czechoslovakian young men got jobs at the stations watching the trains and letting them pass.

The young and innocent Milos Hrma has gotten a job and he is proud.  He is a trainee, and he wears a uniform. He expects that this will help him with women.  He wants to be a man.

Milos looks up to his mentor Hubicka, who seems successful with women.  He wants to be like him.

He flirts with a female train conductor who passes through.

The conductress, Masa, goes for him and so goes home with him.

But it is his first time.

And he is a bit premature.  He finishes before he can begin.  So he is unable to finish.

He grows depressed and tries to end it.

But the good doctor, Dr. Brabec, played by the director, Jiri Menzel, gives him some good advice.

First, he explains that prematurity is normal for young first-timers.  Second, he advises Milos to think about something else.

Woody Allen famously thought about baseball.

Milos thinks about football, or as we say, soccer.

A circus woman comes to town.  She is working for the Resistance during the war.  She helps Milos solve his problem.  This gives him confidence.

He takes a bomb, which she had brought to his supervisor Hubicka, and drops it from a railway signal platform onto the oncoming train.  He is met with machine gun fire and falls to the ground.

The conductress Masa finds his cap.

He is a hero.

The Nazis look down upon the Czechs.  But in doing so they discount their intelligence and bravery.