The King and I

Life goes on, even as the world drastically changes.

by Shaun Brady

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ARE YOU BEING SERVED? Jan Díte (Ivan Barnev) cares more about his own ambitions than the new world order. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

In 1966, Jirí Menzel's Closely Watched Trains placed a naïve young man on the edge of history, watching as world events impinged on private lives seemingly well-removed from the global stage. In many ways, Menzel's latest, his sixth adaptation of work by late Trains author Bohumil Hrabal, serves as a bookend to that early masterpiece, beginning with another wide-eyed youth on another train platform, his personal desires consuming his entire attention as the Nazis march in just offscreen.

But unlike Trains' Milos, I Served the King of England's Jan Díte is no feckless innocent. His surname translates as "Child," referring not just to his playful, boyish appearance but to his immature amorality. Though Díte is a charming imp, there's a crass cynicism to the way he tosses his pocket change to the ground, watching as wealthy men scramble after it. And while he retains his likable mischievousness throughout the film, those qualities are edged with an increasingly darker tint as Díte's growing success parallels that of his country's occupiers.

We first meet Díte as an older man, played by Oldrich Kaiser, released from prison after serving nearly 15 years for a crime not disclosed until the film's closing minutes. As he proceeds to rebuild the shell of an abandoned pub in a forest sparsely populated by other societal outcasts, he reflects upon his younger self with a mixture of shame and nostalgic whimsy.

The young Díte, who occupies most of the film's attention, is portrayed by Ivan Barnev as a Chaplin-esque scamp with boundless ambition. The influence of the Little Tramp and his ilk is made explicit early on, as Barnev's introduction is handled with sepia tints and intertitles. But even as this silent-comedy homage gives way to color and sound, Menzel retains the era's spirit and physicality, viewing Díte as a clown who climbs from penniless hot dog vendor to millionaire hotelier while turning a blind eye to the political realities surrounding him.

Of the directors who achieved success during the Czech New Wave, only Menzel remained in the country, watching while compatriots like Milos Forman emigrated to the U.S. and Hollywood success. True to that experience, there is a sense throughout I Served the King of England of being buffeted by the fickle winds of ideological change. Menzel has fallen in and out of favor with various regimes over the course