It Happened in Europe (1948)
"Valahol Európában" (original title)

A band of runaways and orphans of the war scour the countryside in search of food and shelter. They invade and then taken in by a musician and former concert pianist who's hiding out in a ... See full summary »

Director:

Géza von Radványi

Writers:

Béla Balázs, Géza von Radványi,

Stars:

Artúr Somlay, Miklós Gábor, Zsuzsa Bánki

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Artúr Somlay	...	Piotr Simon, the old man (as Artur Somlay)
Miklós Gábor	...	Hosszú
Zsuzsa Bánki	...	Éva (as Zsuzsa Bánky)
György Bárdy	...	Police Commissioner
Laci Horváth
István Rozsos
László Kemény
Abraham Ronai	...	Ficsur (as András Rónay)
György Bodó
Károly Bicskey
András Tollas
Endre Harkányi
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Ladislas Horváth	...	Kuksi

Storyline

A band of runaways and orphans of the war scour the countryside in search of food and shelter. They invade and then taken in by a musician and former concert pianist who's hiding out in a ruined castle. After the initial altercation between them the gang accepts his guidance and he wins their respect by protecting them from the elements. However, disgruntled townsfolk want to chase away the gang who has been - in their search for survival - laying waste to their crops. A battle ensues ending in the death of a little boy - and resolution.

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Plot Keywords:

gang | boy | teenage boy | post war | children | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Details

Country:

Hungary

Language:

Hungarian

Release Date:

19 November 1948 (Austria)

Also Known As:

It Happened in Europe

Company Credits

Production Co:

MAFIRT

Technical Specs

Runtime:

100 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Tobis Klangfilm)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Voted as one of the "12 Best Hungarian Films" ("New Budapest 12") by Hungarian filmmakers and critics in 2000.

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Quotes

Kuksi: What are you writing?
Piotr Simon, the old man: Sheet.
Kuksi: What's the use of that?
Piotr Simon, the old man: That makes music.
Kuksi: And what's the use of that?
Piotr Simon, the old man: Huh, you can ask me some very hard questions. How do I say? If something hurts you that very much, or something is so beautiful that it cannot be told by words, then it is told by this way.
[begins to play the piano]
Piotr Simon, the old man: It is heard more easily, you understand?
Kuksi: No.
Piotr Simon, the old man: Listen to me. There was once a young man in a far-far away land somewhere in France, who would have a lots of things to say to the people. ...
[...]

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Connections

Referenced in Mansfeld (2006)

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Soundtracks

"Oh! Susanna"
(uncredited)
Music by Stephen Foster
Sung by the children while running amok in the house

User Reviews

A terrible piece of postwar communist propaganda

Besides of doused with Communist propaganda - part of the foreplay which led to a terrible dictatorship in a few years, yet still playing nice and democratic - this is also a terribly bad movie. Those who think I might be wrong because it was voted among the best Hungarian movies, think again. Of course it was - in the Communist times. If you view it that way, then it's indeed a good movie, it fulfills all the requirements of Stalin's and Rakosi's approval. But anyway...

There is no established storyline in this piece of awfulness. The kids run away from an orphanage. For some reason the orphanage contains a theme park with a panopticum of Nazi leaders, in which Hitler is melting during a bombing raid. After a set of forced symbolics, our heroes are on the road - leading nowhere. They meet an old musician who teaches them about how great the French Revolution was, and we also see a former Nazi putting away his uniform and taking up a new role in a new society. And so, what else? The entire story leads nowhere, it's shallow and illogical.

Technically the movie is also a disaster. There are basic editing mistakes, eg. there is a scene which was inserted reversed (see the boat under the bridge actually going backwards), the camera sometimes goes out of focus, equipment gets visible, animals stare at the crew (ie. a dog in the foreground). It's a school example of how the Communists recruited all-thumbs amateurs to replace the great experts of Hungarian movie industry who all fled abroad or died during the war. In its time this movie was heralded as the "greatest movie of all times", its makers were celebrated countrywide, and this lie is kept alive even today, with all the hype around this crap. It's OK to watch if you wish to see something North Korea would produce these days, in a contemporary fashion. But as a movie - forget about it.