Latest in a long history of people who's chief ambition is to get through life by doing as little work as possible, young Milos Hrma (Václav Neckár) prepares for his first day working in a railroad station by recounting his family's history, from his father's penchant for laying on a couch all day and collecting a pension to his grandfather the hypnotist and his futile attempt to stop the German troops through hypnosis. At the station he befriends Hubicka (Josef Somr), the resident Casanova, who advises him on the process by which he can lose his virginity to his girlfriend Masa (Jitka Bendová), a conductress on one of the trains. His attempts in that regard prove to be far too eager, and a distressed Milos, thinking something must be wrong with him, tries to kill himself. But with a girl as beautiful as Masa, anyone would try again. Meanwhile, Hubicka's latest seduction comes under scrutiny from the German military.
Despite the ongoing war, director Jirí Menzel portrays Czechoslovakia as a country obsessed with sex. War is but a minor inconvenience. Even when a bomb destroys the photography studio of Masa's uncle, it has little impact on the characters or the narrative and Menzel spends as little time on it as possible, opting instead to move immediately to Milos' suicide attempt. And why not? When you're in a remote railroad post in the middle of Czechoslovakia where nothing happens except the passing of trains, it's easy to find the terrors of love much more troubling than the horrors of an abstract war. It's only when the war comes a little closer to home, when the bombs actually destroy the building you're in, it even warrants a mention.
That's not to say Milos and Hubicka are ambivalent about the whole thing. On the contrary, when the resistance comes to their door, they are more than willing to help out even if that means blowing up one of their closely watched trains.
But ostre sledované vlaky isn't about war, it's about Milos coming into his own as a man. Václav Neckár plays Milos as a boy who's sexual inexperience informs everything about him, from the way he does his job to the way he relates to people around him, both male and female. Neckár's Milos is timid and unsure, an innocent terrified of the world around him. He so wants to become a man that when he fails on his first attempt, he assumes the failure to be a sign he will never be able to perform and goes to a bordello where, instead of employing a prostitute, he cuts his wrists in the bath. He is so despondent it isn't until a doctor informs him that premature ejaculation is perfectly normal — a symptom of being "too healthy" — and he should practice with an older woman of ill repute and think of football. Not being a doctor, I can't be certain but I doubt this is what they tell people to say in medical school.
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