Budapesti mesék 

13 novembre > SALA 2 ore 21.30

Hungary – 1976 – colore – 89’

CREDITS

Direction: István Szabó

Screenplay: István Szabó

Cinematography: Sándor Sára

Editing: János Rózsa 

Set design: József Romvári

Music: Zdenkó Tamássy

Costumes: Fanny Kemenes

Cast: András Bálint, Ági Mészáros, Károly Kovács, Franciszek Pieczka, Szymon Szurmiej, Rita Békés, József Madaras, Ildikó Bánsági, Maja Komorowska, Zoltán Huszárik

Producer: Lajos Óvári 

Production: Hunnia Studio

SYNOPSIS

Through the revival and adventurous journey of an old wreck of a street car thirty years of post-war Budapest are displayed in an allegoric, poetic vision. On the bank of the Danube a few people hanging around leisurely, linger around a tram wreck in the mud. With great difficulties they put it on the rails, titivate it and begin to push it towards the City in order to reach the safe Tramdepot. More and more people join in, old and young, good and wicked, enthusiastic and selfish, demagogues and democrats. Bloody battles, track corrections, exchanges of roles and devastating fire flares up around the tram, yet it keeps on going, driven by human power.

CRITICAL NOTE

“In Istvan Szabo’s allegorical film ‘Budapest Tales, most of the characters speak in capital letters about Life, Love and the Need to Keep Calm while hitching a ride on the tram of Adversity. There is, in fact, a tram that is a central element in the story plus a few other symbols, including a trapped fish and a caged bird, that are fellow travelers accompanying the human passengers as they Press On. (…) The time frame in this film appears to be the postwar period in Hungary, when displaced men and women wander over a devastated landscape. Several come on an overturned urban tram that has somehow been washed up on a river bank at the end of a suburban line.” (Herbert Mitgang, The New York Times, April 21, 1989)

AWARDS

1977 Cannes FF –  International Competition