RIP Erdoss Pal

Erd?ss Pál has passed away today, a few days after his 60th birthday. He was a Hungarian film director whose films had some deep impact on me. In particular Adj király katonát!. (The English title was The Princess, but it doesn’t really reflect the untranslatable original.) I saw it when I was fourteen. There is no way for me to reconstruct exactly what I felt at the time. But looking back from now I do recall a rather distinct feelings. One on hand it was depressing. I was suddenly exposed to a kind of experience I couldn’t even imagine. It felt like a kind of sheltering bubble burst. The protagonist was a woman just a few years older than I am, and she had a harsh life. She grew up in institution as warden of the state. Then she got out tried to establish a life of her own in the industrial and cruel life of Budapest. She went through tribulations that seemed extreme to me at the time. That’s when my empathy kicked in overdrive. I have seen a few more of Erdoss’ movies and documentaries, but not the recent ones. I am most curious about his effort from last year, Budakeszi srácok, a personal story set before and around the 1956 revolution.