Miklós Jancsó

Reconstructions of unrealized Hungarian films in cooperation with the greatest Hungarian film directors.

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A documentary about the Democratic Opposition of socialist Hungary.

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Jancsó’s farce, similar to the previous ones, is about our time and about death. Pepe marries into a family of mafiosi, with the father-in-law rolling in money. In a joint venture they establish the first Hungarian Prison Limited company, where there is a menu, the prisoners are residents, and they furnish the place of execution for those volunteering to execute themselves. It turns out that the first voluntary hanging should be demonstrated on Pepe. In 180 AD Emperor Marcus Aurelius is dying in Vindobona, being fed with blades of hay by uncle Miki himself, and his son Kornél Mundruczó. Kapa provides for communication: he insists on telling lies, lies and again lies. Furthermore, there are several to die and to revive, to win and to lose, and Melancholy Béla is still alive.

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A collective film made by ten prominent Hungarian filmmakers to express what each of them wishes to bring with them of their own culture and personal experience with Hungary's accession to the European Union.

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This time, Kapa and Pepe are first of all prisoners of war – and convicts taken to forced labor service, Jews, Hungarian soldiers, German soldiers. Once they are to be executed, then again they are to perform executions. The film tells in spectacular episodes about the fact that in the past more than one century and a half we kept marching from war to war; occupation and liberation turned out to be indifferent, and why couldn’t the Jews execute the SS-guys? Our heroes hover about dilapidated barracks, then again on the bridges of the capital they guess whose satellites or eternal friends for all times we might be just now. In the cupboard, among the preserved fruit bottles, Stalin is still hiding. The authors of the film are cited before court, then in a showcase hospital they are waiting for the end to come. A Soviet soldier-maid closes the film with a Péter Nádas-quote.

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A making-of documentary shot on the set of Miklós Jancsó's 2003 film "Wake Up, Mate, Don’t You Sleep".

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A girl is on the skids because of love. A short tempered and passionate young man falls in love with the girl. His emotions are so powerful that he is prepared to surrender his whole personality. The boy has a good friend, who is not sure whether their bond is friendly or homosexual. Before the girl arrived, the friendship was close, but now she has thrown a spanner in the works. How do they react to the new situation?

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Waiters’ competition at Heroes’ Square in the late thirties. Dressed as waiters, Kapa and Pepe awake in the bronze chariot of the millennial sculpture group. They drive along the Danube promenade, and on the concrete reinforcement of the demolished Budapest rondella hotel they get involved in a showdown of political background. In the burnt-down Sports Hall the waiters train for a last supper, Pepe and Kapa run around the big laid table with trays in their hands. While doing so, Pepe keeps crying out: "I am the best one, I am the most beautiful one, I am the king, I am the god..." Sitting in a boat on the Danube, a ship goes past them, and the Niagara falls, majestic and breathtaking, resound in their ears. On each passing away something new will come to life – as rapped by Sub Bass Monster.

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Kapa, Pepe and Mesi would like to buy a scrapyard of trains, to start a nostalgia train and earn a lot of money. The capital to start with they want to get from grandpa, who has come home from America with a suitcase full of money. Everybody wants Mesi to approach the old man, because she is the only one he would speak to. But Mesi is more concerned with the idea that she wants a child, by now from anyone, while Pepe is jealous. Kapa’s alleged son emerges, with the mafia behind him: they, too, are eager to get grandpa’s money. After threats and blackmailing, poisoned apples are sent, with only one side of them poisonous. Those dead, by the way, are resurrected by the sound of a song. At last, nobody manages to get the money, but it wouldn’t make sense anyway: it’s all fake. The Statue of Liberty, however, turns out to be blind.

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In the Kerepesi Street cemetery, three grave diggers contemplate the fate of the world, then they step out of this role and in a sequence of episodes they play the typical figures of contemporary Hungarian reality, the fat cat, the swashbuckler, the victim, underworld chieftains, and present little absurd dramas of love, marriage, friendship, public order and legal safety. The author and the film director walk among them all the time, contemplating, laughing at their plays. The stories starting from the graveyard and returning there warn of the inevitability of death. The author and the director (Gyula Hernádi and Miklós Jancsó) wisely make friends with death.

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The Third film in Miklós Jancsó's documentary series Message of Stones.

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Miklós Jancsó explores Finland and visits relatives

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Anthology film made as an act of protest against Hungarian government of Viktor Orban.

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Concerning the Mátyás era in Hungarian history, during the reign of Matthias Corvinus (1443–1490), the film focuses on three eras of the king's life: the young Mátyás fights for the throne, the older Mátyás as king, and the fate of the royal crown and the royal heir after his death.

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Jancsó’s farce, similar to the previous ones, is about our time and about death. Pepe marries into a family of mafiosi, with the father-in-law rolling in money. In a joint venture they establish the first Hungarian Prison Limited company, where there is a menu, the prisoners are residents, and they furnish the place of execution for those volunteering to execute themselves. It turns out that the first voluntary hanging should be demonstrated on Pepe. In 180 AD Emperor Marcus Aurelius is dying in Vindobona, being fed with blades of hay by uncle Miki himself, and his son Kornél Mundruczó. Kapa provides for communication: he insists on telling lies, lies and again lies. Furthermore, there are several to die and to revive, to win and to lose, and Melancholy Béla is still alive.

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By the notes of Fiáth Pompeiusz, the one-time friend of Kapa and Pepe, Professor Szirtes has solved the secret of the time machine, and he realizes the invention relying on "special" H2O. Kapa and Pepe shall return by it into the past in order to set time right, which is out of joint, that is, to correct history, to save King Louis II, and prevent the Mohács Disaster. Pepe yields to the not too tender persuasion to enter upon the great journey through time, dies and revives, and they arrive at the battlefield of Mohács in time. Kapa films the events. The Turks win and cut off the king’s, Pepe’s, head, still the Hungarians dictate the peace treaty. Kapa and Pepe want to return, they fill the time machine up with water from the well, yet it won’t start. Even so Kapa and Pepe hover over Budapest and quarrel.

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This time, Kapa and Pepe are first of all prisoners of war – and convicts taken to forced labor service, Jews, Hungarian soldiers, German soldiers. Once they are to be executed, then again they are to perform executions. The film tells in spectacular episodes about the fact that in the past more than one century and a half we kept marching from war to war; occupation and liberation turned out to be indifferent, and why couldn’t the Jews execute the SS-guys? Our heroes hover about dilapidated barracks, then again on the bridges of the capital they guess whose satellites or eternal friends for all times we might be just now. In the cupboard, among the preserved fruit bottles, Stalin is still hiding. The authors of the film are cited before court, then in a showcase hospital they are waiting for the end to come. A Soviet soldier-maid closes the film with a Péter Nádas-quote.

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Waiters’ competition at Heroes’ Square in the late thirties. Dressed as waiters, Kapa and Pepe awake in the bronze chariot of the millennial sculpture group. They drive along the Danube promenade, and on the concrete reinforcement of the demolished Budapest rondella hotel they get involved in a showdown of political background. In the burnt-down Sports Hall the waiters train for a last supper, Pepe and Kapa run around the big laid table with trays in their hands. While doing so, Pepe keeps crying out: "I am the best one, I am the most beautiful one, I am the king, I am the god..." Sitting in a boat on the Danube, a ship goes past them, and the Niagara falls, majestic and breathtaking, resound in their ears. On each passing away something new will come to life – as rapped by Sub Bass Monster.

Open details →

Kapa, Pepe and Mesi would like to buy a scrapyard of trains, to start a nostalgia train and earn a lot of money. The capital to start with they want to get from grandpa, who has come home from America with a suitcase full of money. Everybody wants Mesi to approach the old man, because she is the only one he would speak to. But Mesi is more concerned with the idea that she wants a child, by now from anyone, while Pepe is jealous. Kapa’s alleged son emerges, with the mafia behind him: they, too, are eager to get grandpa’s money. After threats and blackmailing, poisoned apples are sent, with only one side of them poisonous. Those dead, by the way, are resurrected by the sound of a song. At last, nobody manages to get the money, but it wouldn’t make sense anyway: it’s all fake. The Statue of Liberty, however, turns out to be blind.

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In the Kerepesi Street cemetery, three grave diggers contemplate the fate of the world, then they step out of this role and in a sequence of episodes they play the typical figures of contemporary Hungarian reality, the fat cat, the swashbuckler, the victim, underworld chieftains, and present little absurd dramas of love, marriage, friendship, public order and legal safety. The author and the film director walk among them all the time, contemplating, laughing at their plays. The stories starting from the graveyard and returning there warn of the inevitability of death. The author and the director (Gyula Hernádi and Miklós Jancsó) wisely make friends with death.

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When Hungary's newest prime minister is shot and killed at a reception, the resulting investigation is necessarily swift and comprehensive. This compelling political thriller uncovers two prime suspects: the woman who guns the leader down, and a man who was friends with both the prime minister and his murderer. Using video surveillance footage, as well as other more artful and symbolic imagery, the noted "visualist" director Miklos Jancso, who is known for his craft in getting his points across non-verbally, combines fantasy and reality in a highly ironic manner.

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From the film-shooting in the Buda Castle Marci and his friend go to a well-paying job. The scene is a big castle in the middle of a huge park. They enjoy the company of the Kid and the beautiful naked French girl, Nathalie. Their job is to watch the monitors on which they can see the Moscow coup détat. By the time Gorbachev is executed the Communist and the Nationalists have taken turns in occupying the castle and the park.

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A focus on the tormented lives of intellectuals who failed to protest recent troubles in their homeland. Jancsó emphasizes highly evocative and ambiguous imagery over dialog or exposition as he – through visually fascinating imagery – depicts the painful, stunted lives of Hungary's intellectuals who have remained silent and ineffectual during various political crises.

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In a drama in which even Gad has a role as well as Michael York, it is certain that serious issues are at stake. Set during the time before the state of Israel was created and established, a British officer has been captured by a band of Jewish resistance fighters with the intent of killing him at dawn. One of the Jews was sentenced to die after being captured by the English, and this death will be in retaliation. The trouble is that a young and ambivalent fighter is left holding the officer captive with orders to shoot him at the pre-arranged time. It is a long night of soul-searching before the Jewish soldier comes up with a solution to his quandary.

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A historical drama set in the 1400s, a young man sent to Italy but is forced back after his father's mysterious death.

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Zsadányi flees from the authorities with his goddaughter, Bankós Mari, and they escape into the forest. The film then skips ahead thirty-fold years: Zsadány and Mari are now lovers, with the sound of war in the background halting their romance. The old friends of Zsadányi have joined with the Nazis, and the landowner living with his peasants in a socialist community grows distant from them. Zsadányi is held responsible for political problems in the country, and will pay with his life.

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The movie portrays a peasant revolt in Hungary in the early twentieth century.

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The setting is a Central European kingdom, near the turn of the century. Bored by his very proper wife, the youthful heir to the throne spends his time in amorous dalliances at a sprawling country estate. His wife departs at the arrival of his friends, and they organize a celebration which becomes a wild orgy and culminates in death and tragedy.

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In this costume epic, the last days of Julius Caesar are chronicled.

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The narrative concerns the barbaric exploits of Attila The Hun and yet none of the characters ever leave the remote seaside stretch of land on which the film is set or do much of anything – with the ensuing moralizing interrupted only by the occasional (and equally obscure) music-infused rites.

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Allegory of the suppression of the 1919 revolution and the advent of fascism in Hungary; in the countryside, a unit of the revolutionary army spares the life of father Vargha, a fanatical priest. He comes back and leads massacres. A new force, represented by Feher, apparently avenges the people, but only to impose a different, more refined and effective kind of repression.

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Croatian anarchists collaborate with Hungarians to make a bid for the life of King Alexander of Yugoslavia.

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In post-WWII Hungary, a group of Communist college students arrive at a Catholic seminary hoping to engage in peaceful debate with its students.

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Set during a turbulent era of disquiet, fear, persecution and terror, which permeates every corner of post-WWI Hungarian society. In 1919, after just a few months of communist rule the Hungarian Republic of Councils falls victim to a nationalist counter-revolution. Admiral Horthy, leader of the nationalist far right movement, becomes the self-proclaimed regent of Hungary, and assumes power as the legal Head of State. Soldiers of the short-lived Hungarian Red Army are now on the run from relentless secret policemen and patrol units of the nationalist Royal Gendarme. If caught, ex-Red Army soldiers are executed without mercy or proper trial. István Cserzi, a former soldier of the Red Army has fled to the Great Hungarian Plains and has taken refuge on a farm, which is run by two sympathetic women.

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In 1919, Hungarian Communists aid the Bolsheviks' defeat of Czarists, the Whites. Near the Volga, a monastery and a field hospital are held by one side and then the other.

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A young doctor undergoes a spiritual crisis when he returns to his rural home.

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One of the earliest works of the outstanding Hungarian director Miklós Jancso was filmed by him in collaboration with Dezho Koza and Gyula Meszáros as a documentary short film dedicated to the propaganda of building socialism in Hungary.

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