The Porcelain Doll
A Porcelan Baba
75 minutes, 2005
Sun. Oct 8, 11:30AM, Sequoia
PORC08S<Buy Tickets>
Sat. Oct 14, 9:30PM, Rafael
PORC14R<Buy Tickets>
A rural peasant boy must compete in a life-or-death track and field competition. A slick-talking government employee offers to bring the deceased children of mourning villagers back from the grave. An elderly couple fleeing ethnic cleansing are granted a mystical reprieve. In this adaptation of three Ervin Lázár short stories, director Péter Gárdos concocts a perfect blend of pathos, psychological dread and deadpan absurdism. You're never sure what the veteran Hungarian filmmaker may have up his sleeve from one story to the next–Richard Lester-like zaniness might suddenly give way to macabre stylings or shellshocked modernity as Lázár translates the author's folksy magical realism into a triptych of mystery and imagination. Supernatural curses and snake-tongued bureacrats may be as ordinary as petty jealousy and mistrust, but this sort of vibrant Eastern European moviemaking is the kind that only comes around once in a pale blue moon. — D. Fear
Director: Péter Gárdos
Producer: Dénes Szekeres
Screenwriter: Péter Gárdos
Cinematographer: Tibor Máthé
Editor: Marianna Miklós
Cast: Lajos Bertók, Sándor Csányi, Judith Németh
Print Source:
Bynyik Enterprises Inc.
2219 West Olive Ave.
Burbank, CA, 91506
Tel: 818.848.5902
Email: hatvusa@sbcglobal.net
Official Website: www.filmunio.hu
