Film

Attention, world-cinema fanatics: Jirí Menzel is back. Actually, the director of the beloved Oscar-winning Closely Watched Trains (1966) never really left—he worked steadily in Eastern Europe throughout the ’70s and ’80s, but the Czech New Wave figurehead remained virtually quiet on the Western front. This throwback to his glory days is a genuine cause for celebration, and the infectious joie de vivre in this tale of an opportunist surfing the seismic waves of history proves the 70-year-old filmmaker hasn’t lost his sprightliness. Judging from Menzel’s preoccupation with nubile female flesh, he’s also retained his sex drive; this farce feels like a rollicking recap of the turbulent 20th century delivered by a randy old goat.

Jan (Barnev) is one of those young screen Candides who treats tragedies as background noise; he’s too busy pursuing riches and pretty girls to notice that ’30s Europe is beginning to burn. Because we meet the elderly Jan (Kaiser) in the movie’s prologue, we know that he’ll endure whatever comes his way; given the world-weary smile the old man flashes, we can also tell that he’s paid a price. Barnev’s Keatonesque performance and the movie’s comic eroticism keeps things light, at least until a few questionably blithe turns reduce complex issues to sex-comedy simplicity (WWII is depicted as part Holocaust, part hot Nazi fräuleins in a pool). Menzel’s balanced serving of bitterness and breeziness, however, succeeds more often than it stalls; such an achievement was worth the wait.