Father (1966)

A boy in Budapest lost his father in 1945, when he was the age of six. He does not remember much of the father but fantasize that he performed various heroic feats.

Director:

István Szabó

Writer:

István Szabó

Stars:

András Bálint, Miklós Gábor, Dániel Erdély

2 wins.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
András Bálint	...	Takó Bence
Miklós Gábor	...	Apa
Dániel Erdély	...	Tako as a child
Kati Sólyom	...	Anni
Klári Tolnay	...	Anya
Zsuzsa Ráthonyi	...	The young Anya
Ilona Petényi
Rita Békés
Judit Halász
Anna Nagy
Zsuzsa Balogh
Judit Zsolnai
Teréz Nagy
Ila Lóth
Géza Pártos

Storyline

Against the backdrop of post-WWII Hungary, the young orphaned boy, Takó, needs to create a loving fabrication for his long-lost father who died prematurely in Nazi-occupied Budapest. Having only faint and disappointingly few memories of his parent and hero--while still struggling to distinguish reality from fantasy--a grown-up Takó embarks on a journey of truth and enlightenment, as he attempts to unearth the identity of the beloved deceased he barely knew. Now, little by little, childhood's wide-eyed innocence gives way to the inescapable certainty. In the end, who was the man Takó called dad?

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Plot Keywords:

war casualty | pre teen | single mother | communism | elementary school | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

Hungary

Language:

Hungarian

Release Date:

4 October 1967 (USA)

Also Known As:

Father

Filming Locations:

Budapest, Hungary

Company Credits

Production Co:

MAFILM 3. Játékfilmstúdió

Technical Specs

Runtime:

88 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Voted as one of the "12 Best Hungarian Films 1948-1968" by Hungarian filmmakers and critics ("Budapest 12") in 1969 and then again as one of the "12 Best Hungarian Films" ("New Budapest 12") in 2000.

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Connections

Featured in Fejezetek a film történetéböl: A magyar film 1957-1970 (1990)

User Reviews

Hungary's changes

Over the years, Hungarian director István Szabó has become famous for films like "Mephisto" (about a man who sells himself to the Nazis for status) and "Sunshine" (about three generations of a Jewish-Hungarian family). One of his early movies was "Apa" ("Father" in English), about Tako, a boy in post-war Hungary. Tako's father is dead, and Tako likes to think that his father died heroically fighting the Nazis. But as Tako ages, he starts to question whether or not that's the whole story, and is determined to find out.

Along with this, "Father" looks at the changes that the Magyar Republic underwent after the war. An example is the school's renaming: previously St. Benedict's School, the pro-Soviet government renames it State School. In that sense, I would say that the movie plays a role similar to "I vitelloni" by Federico Fellini and "The Burmese Harp" by Kon Ichikawa, since they looked at the new directions that Italy and Japan were taking, respectively, and how they were having to deal with what happened during WWII. Hungary also had to do this, although it really had to follow the Soviet Union.

Either way, "Apa" is certainly a formidable piece of cinema history. Definitely one of which the people of Magyarország can be proud. Isten, áldd meg a magyart!