I Served the King of England

A strange and whimsical Czech variation on a Horatio Alger story (*** out of ****)

     

Here’s something you haven’t seen before. It’s the tale of a middle-aged man and a young man, separated by 30 years. The flashback structure is the most typical thing. Stronger on visual flair than plot, the young man starts out in a faux silent-movie segment as a small-time, small-of-stature huckster in Prague who works his way up to a big-time waiter by absorbing the lessons of a series of mentors. The man learns well, seeming to float above everything, including a series of women who wander in and out of the story. Like other characters besides the lead, some make an impression, but most go away soon. The tone is whimsical, slightly reminding me of Amélie, but with less romantic appeal. Still, even a tryst with a hooker seems nearly cute as light classical piano plays in the background. The server, who dreams of money, women, and little else, is a silent witness to the decadency of the prewar era, rendered with tapestries of banknotes, vivid color, and more exotic dishes than an Iron Chef marathon. What separates the young man from his older self, besides 15 years in prison and drab surroundings, is of course the war. Typically, this would be the part in which he wises up and realizes what’s really important, but no, he sees only that the Nazis are being treated badly by the Czechs, and sympathizes with them. This is only one of the unusual things in the movie. Probably two hours is a bit long to tell the story, and only toward the end did I lose my own mild feeling of detachment. But the choreographed, slightly unreal way the story is told and the look of the film give it an originality than may make it worthwhile for the adventurous.