Peter falls in love with Lena, a Bulgarian female student in the days of the 1956 revolution. They were both involved in the events of the Revolution, enthusiastically recount their experiences of an American journalist. The boy's parents leave the country, but he did not go with them.
Two introverted people find out by pure chance that they share the same dream every night. They are puzzled, incredulous, a bit frightened. As they hesitantly accept this strange coincidence, they try to recreate in broad daylight what happens in their dream.
A meditation on love and its various incarnations, set within a community of friends in Oregon. It is described as an exploration of the magical, mysterious and sometimes painful incarnations of love.
Inhabitants of a small village in Hungary deal with the effects of the fall of Communism. The town's source of revenue, a factory, has closed, and the locals, who include a doctor and three couples, await a cash payment offered in the wake of the shuttering. Irimias, a villager thought to be dead, returns and, unbeknownst to the locals, is a police informant. In a scheme, he persuades the villagers to form a commune with him.
A naive young man witnesses an escalation of violence in his small hometown following the arrival of a mysterious circus attraction.
The fate of a Hungarian Jewish family throughout the 20th century.
Budapest in the 1930s. Restaurant owner Laszlo hires pianist András to play in his restaurant. Both men fall in love with the beautiful waitress Ilona who inspires András to his only composition. His song of Gloomy Sunday is, at first, loved and then feared, for its melancholic melody sets off a chain of suicides. The fragile balance of the erotic ménage à trois is sent off kilter when the German Hans falls in love with Ilona as well.
Peter Gothar films give a sharp, uncensored view of the society. This film is no different. The plot is rather simple: a family goes to vacation with the usual stress. Then on the vacation the wife gets a strange kind of sickness and they go back to Budapest for a cure. While the wife is in the hospital, the husband visits his family. This is quite banal. However the scenario was written by Peter Esterhazy, one of the most influential contemporary writers in Hungary. His style uses a lot of surrealism but in a way that profoundly illuminates the reality. In this film, the reality is an atomized society where the so-called communist ideals are nowhere so everyday people are fully disoriented.
During the ill-fated Hungarian revolution of 1956, Karcsi Szabo, star player on the water polo team, is torn between his love for a revolutionary student and his training for the Melbourne Olympics.
A switchman at a seaside railway witnesses a murder but does not report it after he finds a suitcase full of money at the scene of the crime.
Underrated in light of its current (February 4, 2007) IMDb score of 6.4, this film reminded me of what Joseph Heller's 'Something Happened' could look like if a film was to be made out of it. Our middle-aged character's life is in a fragile balance at the start and soon that balance will, of course, be disturbed. Even without much in the way of drama at first, an at times nightmarish reality intermingles with nightmares, and, typically for a movie from this region, state bureaucracy and the absurdities of a semi-legal order play a role in moving developments along. So what is it that awaits our hero down the informal road he is officially sent? Complete deconstruction? Or the 'unbearable lightness of being'? If you give the movie the time to unfold, it will reward you revealing an entertaining concept by the end.
In 1913, an orphaned young woman arrives in Budapest to take up employment as a milliner at the hat store that belonged to her late parents but becomes mired in a search for a brother she had never known of.
The new owner of a brilliant race horse finds love while carrying out his revenge on the man who murdered his father.
In the dense and murky woodlands of provincial Hungary, the search for a child murderer drags a once-respected detective into an all-consuming obsession enshrouded by irresolution and despair, even long after he has been taken off the case. What emerges is not a crime story, but a harrowing venture through the darkness of the human soul.
Swedish account of Raoul Wallenberg, the man responsible for the largest rescue of Jews during World War II.
The Christmas of 1944. The Pásztor family (father, mother, four daughters and a grandchild), are spending the holidays at their country farm. Péter, mothers apple of the eye, soon arrives, and has no objections when his soldiers uniform is made to disappear during the night. The Soviet army, arriving in the footsteps of the fleeing Hungarian army, is commandeering. At night, the soldiers turn up at the house where young women are abiding.
This intricate historical drama tells the story of actor Ferdinand Marian (Tobias Moretti), who is ordered by Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels to star in the 1940 anti-Semitic film Jew Suss. Despite his cooperation, Ferdinand's actions have unexpected costs. Ferdinand's Jewish wife, Anna (Martina Gedeck), is sent to a concentration camp, and as World War II intensifies, he rebels against the Nazis, leading to the destruction of his career.
Astrid is in her late forties and has her life firmly under control. She has fallen in love with Paul, and their first weekend trip together takes them to Budapest for a few romantic days, just the two of them. But in the Hungarian capital things happen differently than they'd planned: They run into Julius, Astrid's first great love, whom she'd met at an artists' party in East Germany in 1986.
Teréz is an obstetrician-gynaecologist. After her regular working hours she conducts a sociological survey about why couples do not have more children.
Rudi, a polite and quiet office hand, shares a special bond with his elderly grandpa. When Grandpa falls victim to a uniquely heartless phone scam that breaks his spirit and his health, Rudi decides he’s not going to let the petty criminals get away with it. But in order to get close to them, he needs to step far out of his comfort zone and turn into a different person. With a band of grey-haired allies on his side, he might just get to the scammers before it’s too late…
The film shows the times directly before and after the revolution of 1956 in a Rosehill villa and its garden, guarded by the state security, from the perspective of a powerful party functionary’s children living there. The children witness a lot of things they do not understand, mysterious things, which they interpret in their own way.
On a single day the fate of three couples are joined and some of them sealed.
The film, taking place in 1950, presents the story of Father Leopold and the monks of his order struggling to once again revive Christianity in a country trying to scrape itself together after the war. Initially, the communist powers do not hinder their work, and the Church was even able to regain possession of holy objects hidden during the war. This "peaceful" state does not last long. Father Leopold is arrested on trumped up charges, and in order to break him, he is subjected to cruel torture. His former student, Lieutenant Keller, who turned his back on religion and now believes in the socialist system, is appointed - upon the command of Major Fyodorov - to extract a confession of guilt. But the Father's perseverance and resistance changes everything.
Eccentric British painter J.M.W. Turner lives his last 25 years with gusto and secretly becomes involved with a seaside landlady, while his faithful housekeeper bears an unrequited love for him.
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At the turn of the 19th century, Pugilism was the sport of kings and a gifted young boxer fought his way to becoming champion of England.
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In Depression-era Ireland, Jimmy Gralton returns home after a decade's exile in America. Witnessing the levels of poverty and oppression, his inner activist reawakens and he seeks to reopen the dance hall that led to his deportation.
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In 1913, an orphaned young woman arrives in Budapest to take up employment as a milliner at the hat store that belonged to her late parents but becomes mired in a search for a brother she had never known of.
Shares a lead actor
In 1973, a young gallery assistant goes on a wild adventure behind the scenes as he helps aging genius Salvador Dali prepare for a big show in New York.
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The fate of a Hungarian Jewish family throughout the 20th century.
Shares 2 cast members
A naive young man witnesses an escalation of violence in his small hometown following the arrival of a mysterious circus attraction.
Shares a lead actor
Katherine Parr, the sixth wife of King Henry VIII, is named regent while the tyrant battles abroad. When the king returns, increasingly ill and paranoid, Katherine finds herself fighting for her own survival.
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A destitute WWI veteran is hired to help carry out restoration work on a medieval mural in a rural Yorkshire church. While living in the quiet village, he forms a close friendship with an archaeologist and begins to come to terms with his trauma.
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A WWII veteran escapes his care home in Northern Ireland and embarks on an arduous but inspirational journey to France to attend the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings, finding the courage to face the ghosts of his past.
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When a new enemy threatens the innocent, Hercules must lead his fearless team of warriors in a battle against overwhelming odds.
A former Marine sniper is lured back in on a top-secret mission to take out a rogue general accused of running a stealth operation of hit-and-run ethnic cleansing missions in an area known as "No Man's Land."
Ede (Dezso Garas) is in his sixties, and he is full of uncertainty about how he and his wife Kati (Mari Torocsik) will fare in the new post-communist regime in Hungary. At least before, he had some idea what he needed to do to get by, and even if he never made much money with his myriad schemes, they got by. Kati has got a real bug in her ear about their livelihood, and is hounding him to get into the spirit of the new system. This is troubling enough for the old gent, but when he runs into an old mistress (Kati Lazar) and discovers that he has a grown son he has never met or knew about, his life becomes even more confusing. His slimy ex big-shot brother-in-law (Istvan Avar) is a major player in the new entrepeneurial risk-taking, and he beseiges poor Ede with advice as well. In this topical comedy, all these worrisome things, and more, come to a head at a big family celebrtion.
In the tradition of "My Sweet Little Village" and "Waking Ned Devine" FLUKE is a satire about a small village full of colorful characters, whose lives radically change due to a miracle. Or a simple crime.
Academy Award winner Istvan Szabo brings to the screen Offenbach's operettas set against the backdrop of power and intrigue in 19th century Paris. Offenbach's Secret follows the staging of Croquefer and Les deux Aveugles at the Theatre des Bouffes-Parisiens founded by Offenbach in 1855. Limited by French law to one act with no more than three singers, Offenbach's early operettas were filled with biting social commentary and poked fun at the moral ambiguity of France's Second Empire under Napoleon III. In addition to Offenbach's vivacious music, the film features lush costumes, period details, and striking set designs.
In 1989, Lara Hill, accompanies her art historian father to an abandoned castle across the Iron Curtain. From a car crash outside of the castle, emerges the beautiful and mysterious Carmilla. Lara secrets Carmilla into the castle and the two are drawn into an intoxicating relationship. But when Carmilla mysteriously disappears, and women of the town begin committing suicide, Lara’s psychic wounds erupt into a living nightmare that consumes the entire town of Styria.
Geri’s life flashes before him in the “Buhera Matrix,” a cringe-worthy slideshow of childhood photos from Pioneer camp to prom night. He relives the absurd clash between Mickey Mouse and socialist youth rituals, debates the perfect horse-chestnut hole size and survives the notorious fruit-game initiation. As the disastrous graduation and its Bavarian-style sacrifices cap off his painfully vivid memories, the film spins forward through Hungary’s late-20th-and-early-21st-century history through the eyes of a ’70s-born generation.
Kató Kelemen is asked by her father to go to his office and welcome an important business partner of his. When Mr. Andersen arrives he assumes Kató is a secretary and instructs her to deliver a letter. He's about to travel to Venice with his nephew who he has never met before. Since Kató falls in love with Andersen at first sight, she decides to dress like a boy and pretends to be the nephew.
The movie is set in the actual "Ki Mit Tud?" talent contest in 1962. In reality the contest in dance music category was won by an army brass band. "Omega" which later became one of the most successful Hungarian rock bands came out in the second place.
