"Jiri Menzel was an actor and stage director before he made his first film, The Death of Mr. Baltisberger, one of the episodes in Pearls at the Bottom, based on the short stories of Bohumil Hrabal. He is frequently inspired by the modern Czech novelists, like Vladislav Vancura and Josef Skovercki; Menzel's philosophical comedies owe much to this remarkable literary tradition. Still his films and particularly the most famous and successful Closely Watched Trains reveal a unique and independent personality, having a universe all his own. Closely Watched Trains is a story of a teenage boy whose greatest concern amidst the cataclysm of the war is how to lose his virginity, and thus enter into adult society. Redemption finally arrives in the person of an extremely attractive blond who is at the same time the leader of the Resistance. But tragedy casts its shadow on the unexpected happiness--at the end of the road he sacrifices himself in the most natural way--and death awaits him, inevitably. Modest events describe and characterize the heroism. No one has been able to portray the boredom, the void of everyday life in a small town's railway station, the longing for exciting adventures, the gentle eroticism of adolescence, as Menzel did, in a sharp contrast to the presence of the brutal war. Its intimacy is the result of a peculiar biting humor and a sexuality that endears the anecdotes with a profound, discreet charm. In Menzel's vision, the average man, the simple common people--the Chaplinesque or Svejk-like innocent victim--becomes the central figure of an offbeat, bitter-sweet poetry." Yvette Biro