Monday, September 12, 2011

Forest (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)
Forest • Rengeteg (2003)


Genre: Drama
Director: Benedek Fliegauf
Starring: Rita Braun, Barbara Csonka, Laszlo Cziffer, Gabor Diossy, Katalin Voros
Duration: 91 min.
Rating: 6.8  

Summary:
An episodic film composed of a series of intense and intimate scenes depicting a loose chain of encounters and conversations around Budapest.

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)


Forest is the debut feature from Hungarian director Benedek Fliegauf.  It premiered at the 2003 Berlin International Film Festival where Fliegauf received the Wolfgang Staudte Award for best new director.

The film begins abruptly with no introduction, where we watch a montage of various people walking around a shopping mall.  The hand held digital camera constantly cuts and moves about, every so often pausing to focus on a random face or an object in someone's hand.  All the while there is a low frequency droning sound that gives us an unsettling feeling. 

The rest of the film features a series of long and unrelated scenes.  Providing intimate slices of these people's lives in the form of close up hand held shots of them in intense, emotional, and bizarre conversations.  The cast of entirely non-professional actors are overall quite convincing, with maybe a couple of uneven performances from some of the supporting players, but nothing too distracting.  The dialogs themselves are well written, with lines ranging between absurdly funny and utterly disturbing.

The camera work though is needlessly shaky at times, and the constantly close up and tightly cropped manner in which the entire film is presented feels claustrophobic after awhile, but perhaps that is what the director intended.  There also doesn't seem to be much of a common thread between all these scenes, except that they all feature young Hungarians in and around Budapest. 

Overall, Forest is a strong debut for Benedek Fliegauf, who shows a talent for building a rich atmosphere, and a unique way of unfolding a narrative.  Returning at the end to use the same opening scene as a bookend, this time we can recognize what we thought were just random faces before, though we are still unsure what the point of it all was.

Bonjour Tristesse

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

Forest • Rengeteg (2003)

9 comments:

Bonjour Tristesse said...

Well there goes my theory...  thanks for your input Palo.

Palo Markovič said...

That would be me and I haven't got the message. I see the film as an excercise in film psychology primer.

Bonjour Tristesse said...

I think maybe this films message was intended for the generation of people who grew up during and after the fall of communism.  So it is hard for an outsider to really comprehend.

Bonjour Tristesse said...

Plot is a type of narrative, but they aren't exactly one and the same, you can have a narrative without a plot. 

Bonjour Tristesse said...

All is well , thanks for the comment

d4 said...

I don't know.. I don't really mind the shaky camera, but I do mind it if nothing really happens. I mean something obviously happens, but if I'm just gonna be a bit confused at the end it might not be worth it. Unless it's confusing because you have to think about it and be philosophical, but there's moods for that.

Hoi-Ming Ng said...

'unfolding a narrative' eh? I dunno, this one seems pretty plotless to me.

The Angry Lurker said...

Good to mention him but the movie is an unique one.

FrontRoomCinema said...

Not really my cuppa tea!! Just wanted to say hi!!

Hope you are well

Post a Comment