thecatcanwait Watched this off one of the freebie sites. Initially thrilled to have found what seemed like an engaging quality foreign film. But come the 2nd half the shiny show-offishness starts to wear a bit thin.Apparently, one of the biggest budget Czech films ever made, its got a Hollywood style razzmatazz dazzle about it; all lavishly set and costumed, glamorous locations, audacious production values, It gets to feel like a musical minus the songs; lots of choreographed set-pieces and sequences: a waiter drops a plate – and every head in the restaurant turns (for example) I'm not used to – or actually like that much – this sort of grandstanding farcical theatricality.The intention is to satirise the decadent hedonism of 1920′s Czechoslovakia through to the communist 1950′s (decadent impulses continued, albeit hidden inside a socialist propaganda blanket) Menzel did another adaptation of a Bohumil Hrabal novel back in the 60′s, "Closely Observed Trains" (I've reviewed it here), and i liked the small scale small time quirkiness of that. This film feels a bit too big for its boots, too drowned out in its own excess to really bring off those minor moments of offbeat irony i seem to associate with Hrabal's absurdist take on the world (I've read some of his fiction)Overall, it feels like a glossy entertainment, a self-conscious amusement. Dripping with naked ladies. Trying hard to be delightful.

Bob Taylor I got a bit of a shock when I saw this film. It doesn't seem to follow the rules of contemporary film-making--in other words, women aren't shown as fully equal to men (although they can be very resourceful in dealing with petty tyranny) and the hero shows no sign of resentment for the way he is treated. I felt a lot closer to the great works of the heyday of classic film by Cukor, Ophuls and Lubitsch. The story unfolds calmly and logically, whether the events take place in the 30's, 40's or 50's of the last century. Ivan Barnev as the young Jan is superb: funny, roguish and balletic (just watch how gracefully he swoops around the restaurant with that heavy tray; wonder how much rehearsal time that needed.) Jiri Menzel made Closely Watched Trains, then saw his career go into eclipse after the Soviet invasion in 1968. The work he has done since hasn't come to my attention until now. This may be his swan-song, since he is 70 now, but I hope not.

Terrell-4 When we first see Jan Dite he is an older man being released from a Czech communist prison. In a bit of gentle humor we learn how fortunate he is. An amnesty has set him free, after he only served 14 years and seven months of a 15-year sentence. His crime? That and other things we'll learn in this picaresque, softly ironic, slightly sarcastic comedy of Nazis and Communists, of getting along and of knowing when to move on. I Served the King of England is a marvelous movie by Jiri Menzel, the Czech director who gave us Closely Watched Trains 40 years earlier. While elements of the plot are discussed, there aren't any serious spoilers. Jan Dite is a young man with all the innocence and practical self-interest of a hungry puppy. He is played by Ivan Barney, short, slim, with blond hair, blue eyes, and a face that, one person said, resembles a mix of, when young, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Roman Polanski and Derek Jacobi. One thing for sure, he's a fine actor. We meet the young man while he's selling sausages at a Czechoslovakia train station in the Thirties. Already he has developed techniques to increase his profit, but he's so earnest, so shy and sly, and so open about it all that we can't help encouraging him. When he realizes even the wealthy will get down on their knees to scrabble after a few coins, he knows he can do just as well as they do. His determination to be a millionaire takes hold. In his climb to success we're with him as he becomes a drinks server and table cleaner in a beer hall, a young man of all duties in a plush resort hotel for the very rich, and a waiter in the dining room of the Hotel Paris, the most beautiful hotel in Prague. Along the way we track his encounters with the arrogant, the wealthy, the helpful and a number of gorgeous prostitutes who service the elderly men who have money. There are voluptuous meals that include oysters, small birds, snails and naked girls, and Jan serves them all. He develops a talent for gracefully dancing around tables holding trays filled with full plates high above his head...and for decorating the naked tummies of lovely women with flowers, or currency, or even the left-over delicacies of a dinner. Roasted pineapple rings were never put to better use. Then the director takes Jan and us into Hitler's takeover of Czechoslovakia, a marriage to a Sudeten lass who is so dedicated to the cause she gazes passionately at a photo of Hitler while poor Jan tries mightily to help make a baby. We visit Jan at work during the war, a wonderful vacation spot run by Himmler where naked Aryan young ladies gambol in the nude, waiting for scientifically selected studly soldiers to impregnate them so that there will be more perfect little blond babies for the Reich. The place soon will be used as a rehabilitation center for soldiers back from the Eastern front with missing limbs. Jan is there, serving and watching them all. But thanks to many valuable stamps taken from the empty homes of Polish Jews by his wife, who left to serve at the front, eventually Jan has his dream come true...he becomes a millionaire after the war, and one who, no less, now owns the Hotel Paris. Jan's basic innocence doesn't prepare him for Communism. At least Jan succeeds in one thing, achieving the company of other millionaires. I Served the King of England is satire, but gently served and with an appealing person in the young Jan Dite (and Dite means "child" in Czech), Picaresque it is, with imaginings of fast footwork, delighted sex, unexpected adventures, innocent opportunism and a funny and delightful score. Much like Closely Watched Trains, there are times when the reality of some of the situations is not amusing. I Served the King of England is that rare movie, a thing to thorough enjoy, with some deftly planted barbs so sharp you scarcely feel them. For something akin to the spirit of the music score, not exactly but with that love for old- style swing, go to YouTube, type in Ondrej Havelka and then click to play the video short "Me To Tady Nebavi." Havelka is a contemporary band leader and singer (and tap dancer) who recreates Czech swing using the appearance of old fashioned style film clips. Bring your love for the offbeat with you.

Red-125 Obsluhoval jsem anglického krále (2006), written and directed by Jirí Menzel, is a Czech film shown in the U.S. with the title, "I Served the King of England." Menzel directed "Closely Watched Trains," one of the great movies of the 1960's.Using flash forwards and flash backs, we follow the life of Jan Díte, played as a young man by Ivan Barnev, and as an older man by Oldrich Kaiser. Díte is obsessed with becoming a millionaire, and the younger Díte manages to accomplish this goal by his total unconcern for the plight of his country and his fellow Czechs. When the Germans invade Sudetenland, and then the rest of Czechoslovakia, Díte takes it all in stride, calmly embracing--figuratively--the Nazi invaders and--literally--a lovely young Nazi woman. I think we are supposed to perceive him as naive and innocent, but my interpretation is that he is willfully ignorant and basically uncaring. My mother always said, "There are none so blind as those who will not see." That quote perfectly fits Díte's character.The film has some comic moments, and the views of Prague are lovely. The movie is worth watching if the opportunity arises, but not worth strenuously seeking out. We saw it at the Rochester High Falls International Film Festival. It will work well on DVD.