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Sunday, Mar 21, 2010
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I Served the King a unique annoyance
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| I Served the King a unique annoyance | |
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by Sara Michelle Fetters -
SGN Contributing Writer I Served the King of England Opening September 5 Diminutive Jan Díte (Ivan Barnev) knows what he wants from life. His goal is to become a millionaire, and if that means selling sausages to train travelers or eagerly learning the ropes with wide-eyed glee at the feet of a cosmopolitan head waiter at a luxurious Czechoslovakian eatery, then he's all for it. And even though his country stands at the brink of war, the German Nazi menace ready to pounce, the young man doesn't let anything stand in his way, no cost too high just so long as his dreams come merrily true. Years later, released from prison after being incarcerated by the ruling Communist government at the end of World War II, Díte (Oldrich Kaiser) reflects on what his life has come to. While not what he imagined, and although he's living in the bombed-out remnants of German-style pub and his days are filled with labors the likes of which would have made Hercules sweat, the old man still can't help but smile. While his dreams have come and gone, the knowledge he's gained in the acquiring (and the losing) of them is admittedly incredible, and while the millions might be lost, the man he's become is hardly a failure. Czechoslovakia's official entry for Best Foreign Film for the 2008 Academy Awards, I Served the King of England drove me absolutely batty. Sometimes glorious, most times ponderous, pretty much all the time unconventional and loopy, this fantastical drama of eccentricity and selfishness struck against the backdrop of inhuman evil and depravity is unlike anything else I've seen this year. That's not necessarily a compliment. Díte, even with his can-do attitude and almost fiendishly intoxicating smile, is almost entirely unlikable. While I can certainly understand the desires for wealth, the way he goes about fulfilling these aspirations most times turned my stomach. Opportunistic at every turn and willing to stab burgeoning friendships squarely in the back (almost before they even have the chance to begin), there is nothing this little man won't do to get ahead. Based on the novel by Bohumil Hrabal, writer and director Jirí Menzel (The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin) takes a sort of a Chaplinesque view of Díte's life and times. The film one part Life Is Beautiful and two parts Modern Times, all if it mixed together with a little bit of The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie thrown in for good measure. The problem is that, as talented as the filmmaker obviously is, all three of the auteurs behind those pictures knew how to drive their themes home to a place of hard-hitting meaning or subtlety hysterical surrealistic nuance. Menzel, for all his visual flair, never quite gets there, the final scenes building to a coda that's as head-scratching and as obtuse as any I can recently recall. Still, I have to say this is one of the few films in recent weeks that I absolutely could not tear my eyes away from. Certain scenes and images are almost indelibly struck upon my brainpan, lavish naked montages inside a German estate and quietly haunting vignettes in the cold Czech countryside hinting at just how marvelous this could have been. Additionally, both men playing Díte are superb, Barnev in particular hitting a note of whimsically driven menace that's almost poetically sublime. I just wish I liked it more. I never felt as if I Served the King of England knew exactly what it was it wanted to be, never got an appreciation for its constantly shifting attitudes. While the movie ebbs and flows to currents that are distinctly one of kind, the waves they ultimately make didn't move me to any sort of emotional release one way or the other. Instead, the film just kind of sat there, pointlessly crashing against a rock wall of its own creation, and for all its weirdly hypnotic idiosyncrasies and slyly good-natured deviousness, the only thing being served was a frustratingly annoying cloud of my own indifference. |
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