Hungary

“Hungarians” is as stolid as its characters, a group of peasants who leave Hungary to work in Germany during World War II. The most knowledgable of them has never heard of Hitler. Yet signs of the war are unmistakable, as bands of refugees and wounded soldiers pass through the farm where the Hungarians have signed on as field hands. Zoltan Fabri’s film details their growing understanding of what is going on around them, as well as the fierce and renewed patriotism they begin to feel during their sojourn abroad.Read More »

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There are times in “Mephisto” when the hero tries to explain himself by saying that he’s only an actor, and he has that almost right: All he is, is an actor. It’s not his fault that the Nazis have come to power, and that as a German-speaking actor he must choose between becoming a Nazi and being exiled into a foreign land without jobs or German actors. As long as he is acting, as long as he is not called upon to risk his real feelings, this man can act his way into the hearts of women, audiences, and the Nazi power structure. This is the story of a man who plays his life wearing masks, fearing that if the last mask is removed, he will have no face.Read More »

IMDB says:
Raffael is the rich owner of a video store. His girlfriend, the attractive Chip works there. They make some extra by making illegal copies of pornographic and horror movies. It is Rambo’s duty to deliver the video cassettes to the customers. Raffael doesn’t know Chip and Rambo are lovers.Read More »

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The real love film tells the story of the “real” man and the “real” woman. What is the real man in life? And the real woman? By recycling the celluloid heroes and heroines of 500 movies (the objects of so many dreams and desires) György Palfi’s collage film shows what they are like and also what happens when they meet.Read More »

A yellow tram lies overturned on the riverbank at the end of the war. Tattered, ragged, homeless men huddle together in a group, load it on rails trying to take it to the remise. Their journey is not easy, they have many difficulties to overcome. Each one has its own drama, yet they are united by a common will to reach their goal.Read More »

In WW2 Hungary, hard-bitten resistance fighter János and naive young mother Kata are thrown together in an attempt to escape the Nazis. Compelled to pose as husband and wife, they are forced into a strange intimacy. Terrified of discovery, the couple are wary of all those around them, and even of each other. As their individual loyalties are challenged, their relationship begins to change – calling into question the emotional certainties of their normal lives, and forcing them to re-assess who they really trust.Read More »

from allmovie:
In a surreal collage of vignettes that add up to nothing in particular, director Peter Gothar starts his experimental film with a family heading off for a vacation at Lake Balaton, the famous Hungarian resort area. When they arrive at their destination, the hotel is partially submerged in water and totally devoid of guests. At check-in time, they are asked to comment on the service in the hotel before going to their room — one single room for the whole family. Is Gothar commenting on absurdities in the society or government? Viewers will have to decide for themselves.Read More »

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A strange young man takes his family’s long tradition of bizarre behavior to new heights (or depths) in this wildly perverse and explicit horror comedy from director Gyorgi Palfi. Kalman Balatony (Gergo Trocsanyi) is a grotesquely fat gentleman who was fathered by an angry hospital orderly getting revenge on his boss by having sex with his wife. While the embittered husband killed the orderly when he was caught in the act, Kalman was born as a result of the wife’s indiscretion, and when he grows to adulthood he earns a modest fame as a competitive eating champion. At an eating contest, Kalman meets a female competitor, the freakish Gizi (Adel Stanczel), and the two fall in love. Kalman and Gizi marry, and she gives birth to a son, Lajos (Marc Bischoff), who grows up to be just as skinny as his parents are fat. Lajos studies taxidermy and takes up preserving animals as a career when he isn’t busy taking care of his elderly and increasingly massive father. Lajos also raises a handful of unusually large house cats, and when they begin to turn on their master, Lajos uses his talents to keep them around the house without the danger of their bothering anyone. Taxidermia received its North American premier at the 2006 Toronto Film Festival.Read More »

This 20 minute experimental short is generally considered to be the start of a new visual style in Hungarian filmmaking. Often called a “film poem” or a “film symphonie”, Huszárik’s masterpiece begins with wild horses, and ends in the slaughterhouse. The film is thought to be an allegory to the human fate.Read More »