THE HUNGARIANS (MAGYAROK)
Hungary, 1978, 107 minutes, Colour.
Directed by Zoltan Fabri.
The Hungarians of the film's title are a small group of isolated peasants in the remote countryside during World War II. They are meant to serve an a symbol of the nation and its people. Isolated they are forced to go to work in Germany to survive. The experience changes them but they have to return and go off to the war. The film is observant in its presentation of human nature but it is also pessimistic in its presentation of the Hungarians. They say that any country allied with the Hungarians is always defeated. There seem to be political implications in this point of view for Hungary's experience in the seventies as well as the decades of being an Iron Curtain country. The film is an interesting war story, presents human beings in a feeling kind of way and has, by implication, political comment.
1. The focus of the title on the nation and the people? A Hungarian production, indicating the quality of the Hungarian film industry?
2. The importance of the World War II setting? Its place in Hungarian reflection of nationalism, the history of Hungary in the 20th century, a political comment about Hungary in the 1970s? The pessimistic view? Hungarian pride, Hungarian defeats and the comment that those who ally themselves with the Hungarians are always defeated? The final singing of the patriotic song? How well do the Hungarians see themselves, place themselves within the European setting from the point of view of this film?
3. The structure of the film with the highlighting of the seasons, the passing of one year? The importance of time, change, progress? The visual picturing of the seasons? The musical accompaniment for the moods of the seasons? The emphasis on birth, work, death? Patterns of living and dying?
4. The presentation of Hungary in the forties? Its place in middle Europe? Its visual beauty? The nostalgia for and the pride in Hungary?
5. This particular group of people an symbolizing the Hungarian nation? Their way of life in the village, isolated, peasants, their need for work, their way of surviving, their group spirit, their beliefs, pride, religion? The way that they were affected by the war? Their having to move from home to survive? Their experiences in being away from home, their horizons being broadened from the elemental way in which they
lived? How well could they understand the world of World War II?
6. The way the film showed them at home, the way of life, family life, the decisions to go away to work, the people who decided to go and their preparations, the indications of their characters, interrelationships, place in the families, local customs?
7. The build-up to the trip, the retarded man and his farewell? The significance of the journey for such an isolated group? Their encounter with the foreman and his organizing their lives, the owner and his remoteness from them? The living arrangements, the way they wore treated, rooms, work? Indications of class distinctions, wealth distinctions?
8. The picturing of the group at work over the seasons, the work in the fields, the striving for more money? The leadership within the group, their collaboration, the sharing of joys, ill-health, death? The importance of the visit to the seaside and its joy and its being interrupted by the finding of the dead body? The war continually intruding in their lives?
11. The Hungarians and the broadening of their views by seeing the various prisoners from various nations? The seeing of their treatment? The importance of the Front and the discovery that the leader was a priest? The women's reactions? His participation in the burial?
12. The presence of the war, its background, the Hungarians not understanding the issues, not really being aware of Hitler? The war victims, the soldiers, deaths, the dropping of the bombs?
13. How was the focus of the film broadened by the attention on the central character and his father, the background of World War I, his heritage, fighting, decoration, death? The pessimistic tone? The new generation in this light and its capacity for survival? The placement of the flashbacks? 12. What had the group achieved after a year? Their bonding together?
14. Yearning for home? The men and their responsibility, the wives and their work and their loving support? The getting to know the foreman well after the confrontations with him? Their attitude towards the war, towards the Germans? Their return home and its atmosphere highlighting what had happened to them?
15. A film of insight into human nature, individuals, society, a group of isolated people and the horizons of their world, such a group in the 20th century, in the middle of Europe?
