Fateless

Colour, 35 mm
Hungary, Germany, United Kingdom, 2003-2005, 140 min
Section: Horizons

Synopsis

The short story by Hungarian writer Imre Kertész, originally published, unnoticed, in 1975 during Kadar’s era, was re-discovered by readers in the 1990s. It caused a sensation and the author went on to win the Nobel Prize for literature. It was only a question of time before the plot would find its way into a film. This sensitive and unusual story about the Jewish boy Gyuri, who gradually falls through the cogs of the Nazi extermination machine, is constructed on the contrast between the horror of life in the concentration camp, and the disinterested, seemingly abstract narration of the adolescent teenager who tries to deal with the abnormal conditions by attempting to view them as something quite normal. After his return he realises that his experience is incommunicable and he has to come to terms with it himself — he can’t even find solace in his Jewish roots, which are now severed, nor his
fellow-Hungarians, who show more indifference and hostility, than understanding and empathy. What will become of him? Does he have a future?

About the director

Lajos Koltai (b. 1946, Budapest) is a highly respected international cameraman. He became celebrated, above all, as a favourite of director István Szabó, with whom he made 14 films, among them Mephisto (1981), which won the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, and other Oscar-nominated films, such as Confidence (Bizalom, 1980), Colonel Redl (Oberst Redl, 1986) and Hanussen (1988). Of his more recent works, we could mention Taking Sides (2001), screened at the KV IFF, and Being Julia (2004). His extensive filmography includes films such as Angi Vera (1979), Time Stands Still (Megáll az idö, 1982) and Dear Emma, Sweet Böbe (Édes Emma, drága Böbe, 1991). The film Fateless is his directing debut and was screened in competition at this year’s Berlinale.