120 Years of Hungarian Film

Müpacinema's new series focuses on outstanding works from Hungarian film history, movies that have been highly acclaimed by both the public and members of the profession alike.  The selection also launches viewers on an unparalleled voyage through time, as each film in the series represents a different decade. We thus will be approaching the present from the past.

In celebrating the 120th anniversary of the birth of Hungarian film, our series attempts to guide viewers through the great eras of Hungarian film history. While the list includes Hungarian films that are now classics, such as Cat City and Dollybirds, we will also be recalling legendary works that are perhaps less well-known to the general public, such as The Toth Family and The Vulture. The time travel begins in the era of silent films. Withstanding the storms of history since this period are two surviving rare treasures: The Exile, directed by Mihály Kertész, better known in the West as Michael Curtiz, and starring the brilliant Mari Jászai, and Jenő Janovics's heart-wrenching melodrama The Last Night, with Lili Berky. The screening series then continues with what is perhaps the greatest crowd-pleaser in the history of Hungarian film. Now you will finally get to rewatch a comedy that never gets old on the big screen: Hyppolit, the Butler! István Szőts's People of the Mountains is another important work, as it renewed the language of Hungarian film. Gracing the screen as a noted representative of Hungarian musical comedy will be 2x2 Are Sometimes 5, while Pál Sándor's cult film Football of the Good Old Days, featuring a young Dezső Garas, not only pays homage to football, it's also a tribute to old-time cinema. Géza Bereményi's The Midas Touch, the emblematic work of the regime change period, cannot be missed from this shared journey either, and finally we will say goodbye with Róbert Koltai's bittersweet masterpiece We Never Die.