A wonderful rags to riches back to rages tale from Czech veteran director Jiri Menzel (famed for the 1966 Oscar winning CLOSELY OBSERVED TRAINS), adapted from the novel by celebrated Czech author Bohunil Hrabal, I SERVED THE KING OF ENGLAND is one of those fantasy comedy dramas that comes around far too rarely but when they do prove such an arresting visual and audio treat that they reconfirm your faith in the cinema.
KIND OF ENGLAND centers around the idiosyncrasies of young, naive waiter Jan Dite, (played by Ivan Barnev as a youngster and Oldrich Kaiser in an older incarnation). Penniless and short in stature, Dite longs to become a powerful millionaire in his own right and gradually realises how he’s going to do it. For he has observed that the high-flyers that he serves in this world have one thing in common: a taste for the exquisite and an obsession with grabbing every penny they can get their grubby hands on. Thus Dite pinches every penny and progresses from a small local bar, to a high-class brothel and finally to the elegant reside of an art nouveau restaurant in Prague. Along the way he has many romantic endeavors with various beauties, taking pride in garnishing their naked bodies with culinary treats at bedtime. However what he doesn’t anticipate is the changing times: this is the 1930s and Hitler’s troops are breaking Czechoslovakia apart. Luckily Dite falls in love with a head-strong German girl who is proud of her Ayran roots and helps keep Dite’s national identity a secret during the totalitarian occupation, until events take an unfortunate turn…
Relaid in flashback from the perspective of an older Dite, who has been released from a lengthy prison sentence and now takes holdings in an abandoned forest cottage, the plot unravels some staggering surprises along the way, but at 120 minutes does eventually begin to feel a little laboured. However the visual splendor and audacious narrative structure keeps things chugging along nicely. There’s some great visual energy here, with an aesthetic sheen reminiscent of AMELIE. The great Prague country is lensed beautifully, capturing the potency of the city, the interiors of the various hotels and bars possess an appetizing finesse and there’s some surreal fantasy touches that keeps things nicely light-hearted. But, like AMELIE its the cutesy disobedient charm of the sympathetic central character – imagine a more acutely ambitious Manuel from Faulty Towers – that captures the imagination.
EXTRAS
No extras were contained on this preview disc.
VERDICT
Exploring impossible survival among capitalism, the Nazi occupation, postwar communism and even provincial exile, SERVED THE KING OF ENGLAND is a sharp, sassy political satire with a confident visual style and a potent sensibility. At times lengthy and overbearing but eventually emerging as beautifully absorbing and cynically life-affirming.
I SERVED THE KING OF ENGLAND is avaliable to buy now on DVD.
