Career train guys in other parts of the world seem to have a tougher time occupying themselves once they hang up the train belt buckle and ticket clicker for good.
One “Odd Horten”–yes, real name…he’s Norwegian–is such a fellow. In a film by Norwegian filmmaker Bent Hamer (yes, real name…he’s Norwegian), Mr. Horten “is rewarded with a silver-plated miniature locomotive after 40 years of service,” reviews A.O. Scott of the NY Times.
“A railway man to the end, he has never been in an airplane and causes some havoc when he visits a friend at the airport, where the rules and protocols are nothing like what he’s used to.
Horten’s adjustment to his new life is Mr. Hamer’s main theme, one he explores with a dry, unsentimental warmth. Here is a fellow who has spent most of his life ruled by a timetable and traveling in straight lines. What will happen when he is allowed to stray, to meander, to loaf?
Even if Hamer’s filmmaking isn’t quite your style–Scott compares it to Jarmusch’s–you at least might have some fun with the Norwegian names in “O’Horten”.
(Please, no hate emails from Norwegian uber-nationals!)