Pushing Jansco
Next Monday, 19 May, at 6:30pm, we're screening a film that nobody has probably heard of by a director whose name rings
no bells.
Why should you come?
Here's what the renowned journal KinoEye has to say:
"Miklós Jancsó suffers an unusual fate in film history. His name is frequently mentioned in film history books, he is a
recognised giant of Hungarian, European and world cinema and his unique visual style and complex studies of power and
the relationship between history and the individual have been feted. The trouble is that, despite the above, outside his
native Hungary surprisingly few people have seen—or can even tell you the name of—any of his films.
In his most famous works from the 1960s and 70s, such as Szegénylegények (The Round-Up), Jancsó used events from
Hungarian history and worked them into incisive portraits of the nature of power and its abuse. In terms of his
cinematic language, he created (with first Tamás Somló and then János Kende as cinematographers) a distinctive visual
style with stunning use of widescreen composition and zoom lenses, long takes with elaborately choreographed camera
movements and a backdrop of the open skies and seemingly infinite space of the Hungarian puszta (plain)."
That's a short excerpt from the 17 Feb 2003 issue of KinoEye devoted entirely to Miklós Jancsó.
You can check it out on the web: http://www.kinoeye.org/index_03_03.php
ENDS
http://www.canterburyfilmsociety.org.nz/