JUDIT ELEK FOCUS
JUDIT ELEK FOCUS
Ceau, Cinema! Festival celebrates Hungarian filmmaker Judit Elek (b. 1937) through a focus of three films organized by the Pelicula Culturala Association in partnership with the Liszt Institute – Hungarian Cultural Centre in Bucharest and the Hungarian Film Archive.
These are “The Lady of Constantinople” (1969), “Maybe Tomorrow” (1980) and “Mary’s Day” (1984), three of her most famous films, presented at the Cannes, Locarno or Rotterdam festivals and now screened in restored versions.
Judit Elek is one of the most intransigent directors of European cinema. With a career spanning six decades, she has made both fiction and documentary films that reflect Hungarian history, unpolished realities of her country and personal stories.
The filmmaker has been honored by retrospectives at the Rotterdam Film Festival in 2023 and at the French Cinematheque in Paris in 2024.
Ceau, Cinema! is a festival dedicated to European film, organized by the Pelicula Culturala Association.
Co-organizer of the retrospective: Liszt Institute – Hungarian Cultural Center in Bucharest.
The project is part of the national cultural program “Timișoara – European Capital of Culture in 2023” and is funded by the Legacy Timișoara 2023 program, carried out by the Project Center of Timișoara Municipality, with amounts allocated from the state budget, through the budget of the Ministry of Culture.
Partners: Hungarian Film Archive, Eforie Cinematheque in Bucharest, Victoria Cinema in Timisoara, F-Sides Cineclub.
Sponsors: Groupama Asigurari, Vitas Romania.
THE LADY FROM CONSTANTINOPOLE / SZIGET A SZÁRAZFÖLDÖN
Director: Judit Elek
Cast: Manyi Kiss, Éva Almási, László Bathó, József Bánfalvi, Itala Békés, Rita Békés, János Csapó
Drama – Hungary – 1969 – 1h16 +15
Language: Hungarian
Subtitles: Romanian, English
Sinopsis
An elderly lady wants to change her two-room apartment for a smaller one. The storm of interested people shakes up her solitary life with encounters that connect her to strangers just for a moment. Judit Elek’s first feature film is a sensitive portrait of loneliness and human relationships presented through unusual everyday scenes and delicate grotesque humor.
Awards: Cannes 1969, New York 1969
18 July, 19:00
Cinema Victoria
MAYBE TOMORROW / MAJD HOLNAP
Director: Judit Elek
Cast: Judit Meszléry, Andor Lukáts, Eszter Szakács, Hédi Temessy, István Novák
Drama – Hungary – 1980 – 1h44 +15
Language: Hungarian
Subtitles: Romanian, English
Sinopsis
A couple in love, but sadly married to other partners. What is to be done? A diagnosis of a comfortable but profoundly incapable society, a Hungary suffering from an endemic private life disorder, observable both among the urban middle and the rural lower classes. A descent into a relationship’s demise – more from the tired inertia of a country that has lost all direction and sense of purpose than any ill will.
Awards: Locarno 1980 – FIPRESCI Award, Rotterdam 1981
19 July, 19:15
Cinema Victoria
MARY`S DAY / MÁRIA-NAP
Director: Judit Elek
Cast: Edit Handel, Éva Igó, Sándor Szabó, Imre Csiszár, Tamás Fodor
Drama – Hungary – 1984 – 2h +15
Language: Hungarian
Subtitles: Romanian, English
Sinopsis:
Based on a diary kept by Julia Szendry, widow of the poet Sandor Petofi. In a country house one day in 1866, she is dying of cancer, and past and present passions emerge.
Awards: Cannes 1984
21 July, 19:30
Cinema Victoria
