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September 5, 2017

Episode 339: Closely Watched Trains (1966)

Special Guests: Jiri Menzel, Peter Hames
Guest Co-Hosts: Jonathan Owen, Samm Deighan

We kick off the first annual "Czechtember" with a look at the most-easily accessible films of the Czech New Wave, the charmingly disarming 1966 film Closely Watched Trains (AKA Ostre Sledované Vlaky or Closely Observed Trains). Co-written and directed by Jirí Menzel and based upon 's novella, the film stars Václav Neckár as Milos Hrma, a young man from a family of eccentrics. Not wanting to work too hard, he gets a job at the local railway station where he's mentored by the earthly Hubicka (Josef Somr) and Nazi-sympathizer Zednicek (Vlastimil Brodský).

Samm Deighan and Jonathan Owen (author of Avant-garde to New Wave: Czechoslovak Cinema, Surrealism and the Sixties) join Mike to discuss Menzel's subversive film and the way it plays with "sex comedy" themes against the backdrop of Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia.

Interviews:
Peter Hames, author of The Czechoslovak New Wave: 1:28:00
Music: "Train Round The Bend" - The Velvet Underground
Jiri Menzel, director of Closely Watched Trains: 1:43:00
Music: "Down There By The Train" - Tom Waits

Listen/Download Now:

Links:
Buy Closely Watched Trains on DVD
Buy Closely Watched Trains by Bohumil Hrabal
Buy Closely Observed Trains (the script)

Music:
"Jumping Someone Else's Train" - The Cure

Watch:

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