Since 1986, all Hungarian citizens over 70 have been allowed to travel free of charge on all domestic lines of the Hungarian State Railways. For some, this benefit constitutes a way of life.

This is how three old men meet in a railway compartment. During this night of travel, not only their bodies, but even their souls are warmed.

Erzsi Báthori:

Interview with film director György Palásthy

(4 December 1996)


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During the second part of the 80s, you were one of the first directors to start making films financed with your own money. What happened exactly?

Following my film about Imre Kálmán, entitled Music of Life, I made a documentary film, or perhaps rather a documentary program, with his widow, about the composer and the age they had lived in with a very small budget. I only had to pay the cameraman, the light-effects man and the reporter, Tamás Ungvári, as the producing studio was happy to let me have the film-portions, and my own work was free. I managed to sell it for quite a good price...to a German distributor. With that money, I set out to realise an old plan of mine, which was to film the 30-minute children's opera by Süssmayer, entitled Grandpa's Name-day. The money was just enough to cover the expenses of shooting the musical parts of the opera. Today, I have the entire musical material both in Hungarian and German, but so far have been unable to find anybody willing to contribute money to putting it on moving picture. Until then, I only worked with government money. True, as I have been in film-making for 40 years, I have learned how to stay within a particular budget. What is more, I usually managed to save something (for which you were entitled to a bonus in those days....). But the orchestra of thirty people, the choir of forty, the conductors, the soloists, the language teacher who helped the children go through the German text, devoured even the last penny. My wife was rather upset and neither did my family like it. I thought a children's opera would be much sought after, but, regrettably, nobody dared to take chances...Of course, I still keep my fingers crossed, as this is quite something if you think of it as contribution in kind, e.g..... Süssmayer has been dead for two hundred years, he can surely wait a couple of years more to get filmed.....

A few years ago, in an interview with you, I read you were making a film with the title Comrade Thursday, or why the Communists stayed here for forty years. Eventually, nothing became of it. Why?

At that time, I submitted my screen-play to the Feature Film Board of the Motion Picture Foundation, i.e. I applied for money, but they did not support the idea. Now Jenõ Hábermann, a producer and the director of Filmart, has taken it into his hands. We have just completed shooting and cutting my latest film, financed with his money.

Is it "Return ticket"?

It is Return ticket, the screen-play of which I wrote as early as the time of government-subsidised film making, based on a piece of news I read in a daily paper. It was when free travel for people over seventy was introduced. The story took shape in my head, I only needed to put it down. I submitted it to Dialogue Film Studio, it has been accepted, but they undertook to provide only 50 % of the budget, the rest I should go out and get myself, they said. Hungarian Television was out of the question then, as the number of films made by the institution decreased to a minimum, and it was even less likely that money should be given to an outsider. As the story takes place on a train, we paid a visit to the general director of Hungarian Railways, he read the script and said he was all for it. We started to get prepared, Illés would be the cameraman, I was looking for the actors, László Mensáros, László Csákányi, Sándor Suka were mentioned in the first place, evidently also because of their age......By now they are all travelling on heavenly railways.... But we also considered Sándor Szabó, Gyula Benkô, Gábor Agárdi, - by the way, he is the only one who had been on the cast already then. Well, one day I read in the papers that the general director of Hungarian State Railways had been dismissed. We got to see his successor, who admitted that the company was in such financial mess that supporting us was out of the question. It is a pity because it was a film for a small budget, taking place at a single scene, requiring no more than 14-15 millions...

As much as was required for A Harum-Scraum Vacation...

Yes...When the Moving Picture Foundation was established, I submitted the script to them, too, but they did not accept it, as I heard it was a close thing, it all depended on a single vote. A year ago, at the burial ceremony of a colleague of mine, I met Jenõ Hábermann, who used to be my shooting, then my production manager. In recent years he has founded a limited company and is now working as a producer. As we conversed, my screen play was mentioned, because I am just like that fellow you know from jokes, who always has "that" on his mind, but I am an old fellow now, and I always have film on my mind. Hábermann asked me to let him see the screen-play. He read it and said that he was now going to take matters into his own hands. He is an extraordinarily talented man, he managed to get money from the Moving Picture Foundation as well as from the television (television will show the film in two parts)... What I have learned from this is that we have now entered the age of producers, and if we want Hungarian film-making to survive, we should support and strengthen these producers.

How can we strengthen them?

Our producers make a living with something else, e.g. by making commercials. Some invest their profit into their company, some use it to produce feature films. Film institutions involved in distributing funds should acknowledge the latter with money or in other ways. I believe it will take at least ten years before these producers will be financially strong enough to undertake the production of a film without external support.

How much say do producers have in a film?

Those who are producers today used to be production managers before, and as a result of the inherited professional hierarchy, they treat directors of my age with respect. Hábermann does not interfere with anything, I had to force him to comment on things. As regards the screen-play, e.g., he said it was good, but he would have not mind if it had been a little more cheerful. We selected a dramaturgist, but it was not of much help. I said, my dear Jenõ, if you empower me, I would like to try another one. He said it was all right. Next time, I think, he is going to initiate things of this kind himself. Eventually it turned out that we did not require a dramaturgist, because as the Jewish saying has it, discussions produce the solution.

This is how the screen-play was finalised, and the next step was to do the casting, where producers have a fundamental power to enforce their will.

Because of wages?

Wages are just one aspect of it, the other is that you have to be able to sell the film. And to get accepted into this "club", you had to be over seventy, and I insisted on the best actors. We did not quarrel much, but if I could not consent to a proposal, I always suggested someone else....

Could you give an example?

I would rather not, because it would involve active people, and I would not like somebody to learn in America what has been said of him here...

What was team-work like?

It was great, but it had always been great, also in my previous films. In The Heir e.g., Latinovits, Iván Darvas, Sándor Pécsi, Gyula Benkõ and Imre Sinkovits played together, well, that was some collection of actors! That far they had only seen each other in the theatre, and there they all wanted to prove to each other what they can do, they all wanted to outdo each other and surpass their previous achievements. In Return Ticket, Agárdy, Bárdy, Zoltán Gera, Kibédi and Sinkovits have been eventually selected to play the main roles, Lóránd Lohinszky, István Sztankay and Kati Lázár play by their side, and in a flash of a scene there is László Méhes.

Has the film been shot in a studio?

Yes, almost everything has been shot in the studio, save the externals. And Hungarian State Railways not only supported us, it was outright wonderfully helpful: we were given a railway carriage, which for days was always were we asked it to be, we did not need to pay for either the rail or the stations. We saved millions!

I understand this was the first time you worked with video-technology. Why did you decide on it ?

Because of money. Approximately 20 % was shot on film, the externals and the close-ups, the rest on Beta. Video is not sufficiently good at defining close-ups, and this shows on the screen. But it was the finishing part of the work which meant real novelties. I have become used to mediating at length in the cutting room, while the cutter was working, I could contemplate the next step. When cutting video, if I said "here", my partner pressed a button and that was it. One could go on. This technology is for young people, able to take decisions quickly and easily.

So the film was shot with a Digit Beta camera, cut on AVID, then the whole film will be put on Beta again, from which it will be rewritten on 35 mm. Who does the cutting ?

The same person who has been doing it so far: Ági Losonczi. She has become very skilled at cutting on AVID, but of course she needs a technician. The film is now completed as regards the visual part, and it is as I saw it in my head originally, what is more, it is at some parts even better. A great advantage of video is that everything is visible at once. Things which we used to indicate with a piece of chalk in the cutting room before, e.g. a wipe, can here be produced immediately, and the same is true for voice. Yet the excitement of surprise, of expectations, is lost. I did not want to know in advance, e.g., whether my grandchild would be a boy or a girl. It is the same with video, it takes away the pleasure of hopeful expectation. But there is one thing it cannot take away, the performance of the actors, that still surprises and pleases me... This is a technology which I will hardly use, let young people take over!...

It seems that they are, 20 feature films will be shown at the Film Week. How do you see the presence and the future of Hungarian film?

It is all right as regards quantity, but it has nothing new to say. Almost every new film fits the same pattern: a house is halfway ready, in it there is a quarrelling couple running up and down, screaming at each other, swearing, then a man with a mobile telephone turns up, envied by everybody, and that is about it.

So far you have been most successful with your children's films, the two hundred year-old opera is also about children. What prompted you to turn to the world of people over seventy? Or is Return Ticket about the same thing as your children's films ?

What I say in Return Ticket is what I have said so far. All sorts of people meet accidentally, and what they receive from each other warms them so that they can embark on the next day. These old men, who in the railway compartment disclose even the most difficult days of their lives, the next morning leave the train anticipating a hopeful day. One is leaving for a street where the rubbish-bin contains the thrown-away clothes of wealthy people, the other wants to sell a copper neck-lace as 18-carat gold, and the third, an impoverished teacher, is recognised by his old students, who wait for him and take him away with themselves.... Each takes something from this compartment, they have seen the life of another, and gained courage from it...

You are a cheerful, serene person, and your films are bursting with a love of life. Also, you had excellent masters. From Gertler, you learned elegance, from Márton Keleti, respect for the audience, from Máriássy, perseverance, from Mihály Szemes, self-respect... Are you really such a cheerful man?

I believe the fact that this year we have celebrated the 1100th anniversary of Hungarians living here is a good reason to be cheerful. In spite of history and wars, I live, telling tales about my father, my grandfather. He who manages to stay alive has triumphed here. And besides, I never wanted to be either principal director or chairman, just director. This is why I was always left in peace, being able to work peacefully. Just like now....


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