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Had to replace the earlier comment.-- I HIGHLY suggest to you an Anime series called "Girls Last Tour" for something that will stay with you. It is about two teen-aged girls navigating a Post-Apocalyptic setting where the dreadful truth of it all, while subtle, is so monstrous that any hero we are familiar with would have lost their minds very quickly... but not these two little heroins. They were born into a world with no hope, but they face it with the kind of simple grace & dignity that makes you glad.... glad that these two were the final representation of Humanity. You'll see.
The "problem" with your videos is that they're so good that they make me want to stop and go watch the film to try to get at least a drop of what you show and say. That's how great you are! (but I keep watching them to the end)
Your conclusion reminds me so much of the cinematography of Lars Von Tries, a same ineffable quality, grounded in a sense of humanity. Thanks for your work.
I'm Hungarian. There was a screening of Sátántangó in Budapest and a friend of mine got excited and told all his friends to come and see it together if anybody wants to. I didn't go, and i hate myself for it ever since, because as they sat down (it was a small theatre, 50 seats max) right before the movie started in walks Béla Tarr, says how grateful he is that people came to watch his movie, said a couple of words about the movie, and "enjoy!" He left the room, and the movie started. :)
@ruukaoz I'm really sorry, 😱I don't want to be in your place for a second. God gave you great directors, Gabor Body, bela tarr, Miklos jancso, sazbo ...
Well done 👏 As a native Hungarian, I have to say that these films capture not only the essence of "Hungarian-ness," but also "human-ness" at their core. These films are a quiet, gentle slap on the face that make you open your eyes and wake up to (an unpleasant) reality we usually prefer to pretend not to see.
@@je-freenorman7787 I suspected that you might be getting at this, but I gave you the benefit of the doubt. My only response is, "He who is without sin cast the first stone."
Loneliness is a longing for a connection not only to ourselves but to the world around us , especially in our times of need. It is as if we’re walking the world aimlessly in total darkness without a light in sight. Hoping that someone will find us , hold our hand , bring us home and wrap us in a warm blanket of togetherness . We want a safe space for our vulnerabilities, a place where we can take our shoes off and not worry if we muddy the rug. A hug that reaches to the depths of our inner child and brings fourth a glimmer of hope that everything will be ok and to know that someone will walk beside us as we journey into the sun until we are ready for them to become a shadow behind us …. ( Home)
Bro I am screenshoting this and writing it down word for word and giving it to this hot emo chick I want to bang so she thinks I'm deep and philosophical. Thank you man.
I remember watching the The Turin Horse one night and just being completely and utterly entranced by it. The one shot scenes of the daughter walking some 5 minutes through the valley to get water from the well each morning, the sequences of them eating their daily ration of one potato in complete silence, the musical cadence that plays throughout the entirety of the film just becomes hypnotizing. Stunning direction and cinematography, you’re just watching characters react to their surroundings without the need for almost any words or dialogue. It’s certainly a film you’ll likely never see replicated.
I was thinking of how all “movies” are a template nothing more. Opening TH-cam this morning and within the first few minutes the line “until someone is out side of the norm do you feel friction” hooked me.
One other thing to consider is just how incredibly cinematic Tarr's films are. His cinematic approach to film making highlights his humanistic philosophy in that all human beings deserve dignity. Tarr gives each of the characters in his film the chance to inhabit a beautiful work of art, as if to say "Yes, this person might be "ugly", but life, no matter how bleak, is still worthy of dignity and is beautiful in its own way". And then just to drive the point home, he allows the audience to spend so much time with each of these characters because he not only wants us to see their worth and their dignity despite the grime and sadness, but also to LIVE and FEEL their worth and value as human beings. He doesn't let us just take a quick look at his characters, he demands we live with them and in the process come to empathize with them.
I think the long cuts serve a very practical purpose. Processing emotions is like pouring water on the soil. You can only do so much actively, but in the end, you have to give it time to soak in. All these cuts are very monotone and you can analyze the scene all you want, you run out of it and the cut still goes on, and your brain switches to idle mode. That's exactly when the subconscious processing begins. So he doesn't let them wash away at surface level, doesn't relieve you, he patiently makes you wait until it's all soaked into your very core. If you let that happen, they will haunt/awe you for many years.
Haven’t watched the video yet, but OH MY GOD. You’re arguably my favorite video essayist on TH-cam for the soulfulness and the existential themes of your writing and your approach. And Bela Tarr is my favorite filmmaker of all time. I can’t believe this is happening 😭😭
I'm so happy you made a video on Béla Tarr. Above all "The Turin Horse" is one of my favorite movies and for me one of the true masterpieces of 21th century cinema!
So happy that you address Bela Tarr. The Turin horse and Satantango are most of the most gorgeous black and white movies ever. They are super underrated and sometimes difficult to get. But oh so beautiful…
This consideration of Bela Tarr exists within the context of the Hungary that Bela Tarr grew up in: The transition from Soviet domination & control of communal farms and the "cap" the Soviets kept by keeping ethnic tensions below the surface by a police force that all suddenly evaporated at the collapse of Soviet rule and was followed by chaotic mismanagement and random acts of petty ethnic violence. The experience of sitting in a theater and viewing a Tarr film on a big screen (as he intended) is rare, it only happens at a University Art Museum context doing a Tarr retrospective. The beauty and cinematic skill of black and white cinema and its dynamics of extremely intentional moving tracking shots that follow person(s) through spaces and landscapes & the faces of non trained actors who are all Tarr's friends that express the real beauty and dignity of the people of Hungary who get "pegged" as what the artist Kathe Kollwitz called "the down-trodden" appear in Tarr's expertise of filmmaking expressing human dignity more immediate and raw than any other appearance in the history of cinema. The "Turin Horse" is set in Northern Hungary in the late 1890's when the entire region was devastated by extreme drought that lasted over 5 years. It was an area of Eastern Europe without theinfrastructure of water and power. Well water was how the people survived, and when that dried up we get to experience that via Tarr's cinematic vision. You got it right when focusing on Tarr's intentional expression of "human dignity".
@@Hugatree1 It is repeated or reset as has been in the past. Problem is that greed takes over those that take the lead after those that survive chaos rise from the ashes. All that is left is there for the taking and from there everything else can only be conquered from that point forward. The family in America is put into competition within one another as in multiple children and the college madness. Children must find a passion or love of something and make that a career regardless of money. That person needs no alarm clock. The money will come along with being the best at what you do and love. Its pure. The corporation is anything but pure well just pure profits and the love of that greed. Modern Humanity is a failure...A pure failure. And nuclear energy is the ultimate reason why when the power goes down even earth as a whole will burn for it. That moment fast approaches as I type this comment. Best of luck to you.
@@jukee67 Well said. And another part of this tragic circumstance is the chronic impatience and forgetfulness that is exponentially growing in the United States and Americanized modern society. As a person from Ireland with a strong connection to the deep dark part of my soul, I am extremely familiar with the work of the Irish playwright Samuel Beckett. I have watched his play Waiting for Godot at least 10 times. Yet probably less than one in 100,000 Americans have probably heard of him, let alone seen his works. I would say the same regarding the works of Ingmar Bergman and Akira Kurosawa. Here is an odd truth: there are more than 2.5 million ants to every human being on planet Earth. Humanity's egoic, hubris ridden sense of importance ironically denigrates the strange, suffering wonder of being human, as well as the rich complexity of the biodiverse Earth of which we are a part. If we could accept that our being conscious, SENTIENT beings AUTOMATICALLY involves SUFFERING, we might go a long way to adjusting to the existential reality of being on planet earth. Unfortunately, I am one that does not see this version of human society lasting more than another 100 years or so. It is simply not sustainable.
About the 1890s. The Austro-Hungarian Empire built up the fourth-largest machine-building industry in the world, after the United States, Germany and the United Kingdom.[8] Austria-Hungary also became the world's third-largest manufacturer and exporter of electric home appliances, electric industrial appliances, and power generation apparatus for power plants, after the United States and the German Empire,[9] and it constructed Europe's second-largest railway network, after the German Empire. I also suggest to watch the housing conditions and lifestyle of English working class, the average people of England, it was not better.
I've been watching your programs for a few years now. I want to express to you how much they have have sharpened my understanding of filmography, and how they have unlocked the hidden beauty these films contain. I think your are a treasure. Your fan forever.
The opening is great, but the monologue of the protagonist's uncle about the Harmonies is the highlight of the film. Sadly, that's the last vital scene in the entire film until the hospital scene and its use of silhouettes.
If ya like the work, check out its source material. It's based on a novel by the title of The Melancholy of Resistance by Laszlo Krasznahorkai. He's a great writer.
Incredible video. I had the chance to see "Satantango" in a movie theatre in a VERY cold night. I walked for hours trough the city after that. I never been so imersed in something in my whole life. It took months for this dreadfull feeling of my scale in the cosmos to leave me. Best film ever made in my view.
You are like the Werner Herzog of TH-cam, the depth and soulfulness of your videos are amazing. Also, like Herzog, even when you're talking about the bleakest of matters I still find your voice so soothing.
Just discovered your channel by searching for movies to watch 2022 edition and this was my second video after I finished the first one. I have to admit that generally I don't enjoy watching movie reviews because they lack a deeper meaning and sensibility, but you are such a great storyteller. I almost felt like in a movie theater for 37 min straight.
It's worth reading the Krasznahorkai novels behind two of the three Tarr films you mention; they require a disciplined attention but are not as demanding as one might be led to expect from the films. Krasznahorkai's life-philosophy is not Tarr's, but the bleak luminosity of Tarr's films resonates with the apocalyptic style of the source-material. Also, the Werckmeister Harmonies soundtrack (especially "Old") is well worth a listen on its own.
I've only read Satantango, but it definitely complemented the experience, philosophically and even visually. Seriously the best written depictions of rain, wind, and darkness I've ever read
Thank you so much for an introduction to this genius I was unaware of. I work in film and am currently struggling to assist the director with post production editing issues. I’m also a fine artist and a gallery owner in LA working on a large body of art. I’ve shifted into monotonous work and the cinematic grey he filmed in has further validated my desire to continue painting this work. Bravo to you Sir!
I've only watched the wonderful "Turin Horse" and two hours of "Satantango", ten years ago. Mu strongest impression was I was less watching a film, than living inside it, sharing the lives of those people. In the art of filmmaking I know of no one who compares to Bela Tarr. We can trace him some precursorr, like Bresson, Bergman or Tarkovsky, but Tarr is not reducible to any of them, he is truly an original.
This is a wonderful, insightful documentary, done with absolute sincerity and love without being pompous. One of the best online docs on a film maker I've ever seen and it's absolutely certain I'll watch The Turin horse.
The first film from Bela Tara I saw was Werckmeister Harmonies. I'm about an hour into Satantango (I like your idea of watching it all in one sitting). I honestly don't remember many of the details from the story of Werckmeister Harmonies, only how it made me feel. And to me what comes across is how, as humans, we always try so hard to survive-no matter how bleak and desperate things are. Even knowing that things are likely going to get worse and feel more bleak-we can't help but push forward... we do what we must to survive the next moment, and the next as best we can.
The story of Nietzsche's breakdown closely resembles Raskolnikov's nightmare in Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment. I wonder if Tarr was trying to reference both of these great thinkers in one go.
Another masterful video essay. Watching the timelapse footage of Tom watching Satantango reminded me of my own home viewing of the nearly 3½ hour _Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles_ some years back. I was somewhat proud of myself that I watched it straight through, without so much as a bathroom break. Of course, at less than half the length of Satantango, it was maybe not so heroic a feat. One of these days, perhaps, I'll get around to watching Tarr's epic...
Excellent analysis of Tarr's work. Worth to mention that most of Tarr's movies are based on novels and stories of the Hungarian writer, Laszlo Krasznahorkai (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A1szl%C3%B3_Krasznahorkai). Tarr and Krasznahorkai have been entangled in a extraordinarily creative way.
As a hungarian i heard only the director's name here and there, however this video make me to watch these fascinating piece of cinemart. Its odd (and sad?) that i had to meet with these informations on an foreign youtube channel. Thank you, LSO.
Your channel popped up unexpectedly- I have never heard of this fiilmaker - but I watched right to the end your incredibly well-researched and beautifully narrated video - this is the sort of filmmaker I have been searching for - thank you so much - all the best from Melbourne Australia - Mike
Absolutely lovely video - just the sort of intro an absolute beginner who knows nothing of Tarr can watch to help ease their way into his work, yet insightful enough for seasoned viewers to find something new. Convinced me it's time to bite the bullet and watch Satantango. Incidentally, you have a great face for B & W. Good bet many who watch will probably fall in love with you.
I love you. Thanks for this. Tarr really carried on Tarkovsky's sublime work on the use of unbroken time to love by way of seeing(my own very subjective experience.) Thank you for touching on all the aspects of Tarr. The multiplicity of his art.
3:00 Not once in my entire life I have ever felt "accomplished" by watching a movie I didn't enjoy to the end and I can't say I understand this mindset. Whenever I watch a movie I didn't like till the end all I feel is that I wasted my time and the longer the film was, the more I regret watching it. Can't imagine sitting through almost a full day of work of a movie I didn't enjoy and feeling "accomplished".
I think that Tarr tried through feature and shot length to allow the movie to impose its own temporality upon the viewer in a much more invasive way than usual. I see it as a deliberate effort to bring about a spatial reconstruction in the viewer's mind. Thereby drawing one into the distances and times associated to his movie's landscapes. One consequence of this is a detachment from the expectations tied to narrative structure and the rules of storytelling as the viewer is much more closely bound to the same temporality as the characters and objects on screen, which I feel drives to a greater focus on the setting. If, as Tarkovsky puts it, a director is "sculpting in time" then him and Tarr through it definitely created a distinct space in our minds. A "moviescape" around which the viewer's entire temporality must revolve, as you showed in your montage. Anyway, another great and challenging essay. Thank you.
I saw Werckmeister Harmonies in film class at UNC and it blew my friggin' mind. It was a course on the opposite of Hollywood cinema and this one really stuck with me. I had no idea films could be so.....incroyable. Changed my entire perspective on film and what it could be. The long takes, the length of the movie, the setting, the bleakness & isolation, I think about it often still 10 years on. Just incredible.
Thank you for this. Love your work. I also watched Satantango about eight years ago, and the same year I read Infinite Jest; so I can totally relate to what you said about that feeling of accomplishment from finishing such works of art; almost physically draining. What you said in the end made me think of Gilles Deleuze's writings on cinema and what constitutes the viewing experience as such. Might be interesting to you! So glad that I found your channel. Blessings from Sweden!
I found Jest through great enthusiasm, shared and celebrated, animated with wide eyes over spilled drinks in Hanoi bars, physically igniting. Twice read, put a gallop in the step of my perceptions.
@@ro55reel5 You read it with others? In like a book circle? I will probably read it again someday. I think I could appreciate the nuances more these days. And I would say DFW:s dystopic future has been all but realized by now, at least when it comes to the prevading mentality in the culture, our tendency toward isolation and comfort in the form of entertainment, drugs or delusion.
@@FriAnde92 ah no book circle, was lucky to be around a few people who were enjoying the book at the same time. Yes I agree, the entertainment has many of us catatonic.
Tom I'm incredibly happy to see you return to a more philosophical video once again, whilst I enjoy your videos on intricacies of filmmaking, I adore your videos that touch upon philosophy and human nature
There are different schools of cinema and the factors can be many, for example geographical, cultural, historical and influential cinematographers of the past. We can see in his work Bergman, Tarkovsky, even characteristics of New Wave. Of course we the film lovers appreciate old school cinema, therefore thanks for your wonderful work 🙏❤️🎞
Bela Tarr was described in a Guardian article in 2000, along with directors such as Pedro Costa, Sharunas Bartas, and Fred Kelemen (also dp of two Tarr movies), as "rare, rejected but vital castaway directors." By the time of The Turin Horse, Tarr was much better known and quite revered. The style of filmmaking employed by Tarr and others, of long takes, bleak settings, often non-professional actors had, over the previous decade also become more common, admired, and seen to be worth borrowing, at least partially. Director Steve McQueen is also mentioned in the article. At this point he is still a museum installations artist; he is mentioned because he brought screenings of Bartas's films to London. It's interesting to me how Tarr went from being overlooked for over a decade following Damnation, then rose to a prominence that he deserved, saw his influence disseminate widely and elements of his style be frequently employed. Then he retired, and his style of filmmaking became again an only occasionally seen, marginal pursuit. Satantango dropped 42 places on the Sight and Sound critics' poll, while an alternative long-take movie 'Jeanne Dielmann...' was promoted to first place. I've only watched Werckmeister Harmonies and The Turin Horse. I really like Gus Van Sant's Tarr-inspired trilogy of death films, Gerry, Elephant and Last Days. The cinematography of those films, plus Sofia Coppola's supposedly 'Jeanne Dielmann...' inspired Somewhere, all shot by Harris Savides, is some of the best in cinema. On another note, a subject in cinema that has preoccupied me for a while is the compare and contrast--the idea of the continuities and innovations--between the traditional Modernist art cinema of European masters such as Fellini, Bergman, Antonioni, Bresson, Tarkovsky, Herzog, Fassbinder (and the above Guardian article mentions Hungarian Miklos Jansko) and the later cinema of filmmakers like Tarr, Haneke, Claire Denis, Bruno Dumont, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Cristian Mungiu, Sergei Loznitsa and Andrei Zwagnitsev (and perhaps several Asian directors, Tsai, Jia, Apichatpong). This subject is very much akin to the question you pose in this video: how and/or why are Tarr's films different from Bergman, Tarkovsky and Malick's? They don't evince a faith in God, as the films of those directors do. Is that all?
Cinematography in Tarr's movies surely owes something to Tarkovsky's. But in a certain respect Tarr is at the antipodes of the russian. In Tarkovsky's films there is a lot of melancholy, but also a longing for hope, while in Tarr thereis only bleakness and despair. Feelings btw that are not very Nietzschean, since Nietzsche hated and feared nihilism. The Nietzschean message of eternal return means you must accept and love life as it is, to the point of wishing that your life (with all its pains and joys) would repeat itself eternally.
@@dagerman7032 I've only seen two Tarr movies, but I don't think there is only bleakness and despair in them, but rather both Werckmeister Harmonies and The Turin Horse evoke autonomous cinematic worlds containing a diversity of things and a range of characters. Yes, the trajectory of each film's narrative is towards a kind of apocalypse, but so is Tarkovsky's The Sacrifice. Yes, to your point about Nietzsche. It is not me who's saying that Tarr's films are a Nietzschean vision. The Turin Horse is surely a rejoinder to what Krasznahorkai and Tarr view as Nietzsche's effeteness and hypertrophied intellectualness. In place of this affliction which resulted in his terminal breakdown following the incident with the horse, they propose the example and worldview of the horse's peasant owners. Eating boiled potatoes after the lights have gone out, unto the end of the world. There is obviously a hopefulness underpinning their rough-hewn, extremely common-sensical existence.
@@lorcan545 You're probably right that it's not all bleakness and despair in Tarr. Actually, I was thinking mostly of Turin Horse. My remark about Nietzsche was not directed at you, but at the author of the video, who passes the erroneous idea that Nietzsche was a nihilist, when in fact Nietzsche sought more than anything to escape the nihilism of a world without god nor purpose.
Wow! I just stumbled onto this clip. What a visionary Bela Tarr must have been. I feel as though I just discovered a small box of treasures hidden in a hole in a tall dead oak tree. It's the middle of the night in the dead of winter and I am afraid to open the box and sift through the treasures for fear of cutting my hands to shreds. And yet, I know I will but not tonight. Tonight I will content myself with listening to Chopin and recalling the images of Nazi atrocities and marvel at that glorious interaction between exquisite art and the bitterness of reality men are so capable of producing simultaneously. I'll be back.
No whale has ever haunted me like the whale in Werkmeister. As a lover of bleak weather, I enjoy watching Tarr’s bleak movies. Thank you for posting this wonderful look into a great and daring filmmaker.
Beautiful video. I remember when I watch Satantango : I prepare some food, turn off my phone and cut internet. It was a great experience. I wish I saw the film in a theatre. Another similar experience was watching live The Third Day - Autumn. It was 12h I think. All shot live and broadcasted on Facebook.
I've only seen one Tarr film, The Turin Horse, which I though was excellent. I'm looking forward to exploring his films with the new box set from Curzon!
Thank you so much for this essay, it's really wonderful. You've done a very good job and your analysis is great. I like a lot the part about Nietzsche. From a Bela Tarr's fan ;)
I watched this movie 2 years ago I just did not anticipate the effect on me. I liked it but it is not like I was really entertained. I still remember it and what I felt during the film vividly. A gutteral awe.
I think after hearing about the eternal recurrence dozens of times, this is the first time I really understand the meaning, from your thoughts in this video. Great essay!
Thanks for the video. Totally forgot about Bella Tarr. I remember seeing Wrekmeister Harmonies at the NYCFF many years ago. Definitely challenged my view on how narratives in films “should” be constructed. I think the Daniels (directors) today are also motivated to break down this collective movie logic as well.
As much as I loath the corporate centralization of information and the for profit algorithmic approach to the internet I still find things that are worth wild that prevent me from disregarding these platforms regardless of how i feel about them in an ideological sense. Great Video.
12:25 - Yep, been reading Nietzsche for years now. Almost always something new to find every time you pick up his work, whether it's because your perspective has changed, or because you didn't fully take in the density (between the lines), and/or as you mentioned, volatile writing. I'm at the point where I'm starting to see some of the contradictions in his work, which is very interesting.
I was wondering about this. And thinking about the writer in broad scope, for me, there is a different, jubilant, jokester Nietzsche, like the voice in Ecce Homo.
20:37 _"It's a rather poetic description, but what I think he's really proposing here is not so much a scientific perspective on the objective nature of reality; he's not literally suggesting that our lives are replayed on an endless loop; it's not a commentary on determinism or individual agency. Rather, it's more of a thought experiment in which he tries, like Tarr does in his films, to force us to truly regard our world and our existence as it is, and to find meaning in what we directly know and experience. This obviously means to discard all escapes into faith, in which life tends to be seen as a passage towards something else, be it reincarnation, heaven, or some other spiritual realm; and in which meaning tends to be handed down from above, or from beyond what we know. But, in a way, the concept of eternal recurrence also goes beyond more atheist perspectives by denying us the escape into death as well. In other words, in our quest for meaning and our general understanding of what it means to be human, we cannot appeal to any form of external resolution - not even oblivion. And so, what eternal recurrence really implies is a radical grounding in the here and now, an imagined fate to make us question who we would be, how we would act, if all there ever was and will be was_ this; _no guiding stars, no salvation, no escape."_
I feel like you will have a story for Andor. The 12th episode and funeral march... and what led toward that. What I've heard is that Andor, as a series, started as the idea of the funeral march... was written out from there. In the meantime, I love your stories and videos.
I was a little sceptical before I saw it. I'm pretty allergic to arty/quasi-intellectual works of any kind and there are so many poseurs, but this wasn't that at all. You don't need an ongoing symbolism analysis or extensive knowledge of anything to get sucked into the most oppressive atmosphere imaginable in a film. It's simply incredibly well crafted and I found it baffling and exhilarating in all its gloominess. I didn't know much about Nietzsche at the time. Now I know a little more, enough to not have to spell check his name, but at the time all I really focused on was the idea that this must be the time when God had drawn his last breath and the world was indeed going to hell. Not with a Hollywood bang, or a theological drama, but simply with the heaviest of nihilistic sighs; dust, emptiness and release. That's how I remember it anyway. I loved it and I have been saving up a review for over a decade. My name is Ozymandias.
@@Maciekk_ "I met a traveller from an antique land, Who said- “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand, Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; And on the pedestal, these words appear: My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair! Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.” - Shelley 1817
@@QualeQualeson do you really think there are many poseurs and quasi-intellectual works out there? I don't really see that as an extensive problem, at least not in the past 20 years, not when I can stream nearly anything I want. Of course, I'm pretty isolated and out of touch nowadays
@@squirlmy Well, poseurs... depends on where you're looking. But speaking on film, I think you're right in that there are fewer now. Just my impression. I think that to some extent the mighty have fallen, French pop cultural "intellectuals" and so on. Though they certainly still exist, they're not cheered on by the elite so much anymore and they're typically representing the opposite of what's being put on screen. The whole thing has shifted considerably.. there are so many aspects. Like for example theatre and literature influencing film making to a much greater degree than now. Everything has become dumber, but also less full of itself, at least intellectually speaking (PC/identitity culture is certainly also full of itself but in a very different way). It's an interesting, but also very big topic. A long discussion poorly suited to this format. But yes, I'm inclined to agree with you.
In his book, The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis describes a Hell that is surprisingly similar to what is depicted in these films. Rather than a pit of fire, he depicts it as a dreary, endless and meaningless existence in which you're continually subjected to petty conflicts with others.
Thanks for posting about this film, I'll remember watching this film but I don't get the meaning or message they want to tell, this is beautifuly presented and articulate thank you.
Remember growing up, there used to be a running joke about eastern-european movies, that theyre always were depressing and in black and white. Nowdays Ive come to appreciate the style a lot and even find myself enjoying (if thats the right word for it) the tone, style, tempo and themes. Appreciate your take on it immensly, good work.
Just one correction: Hungary was never part of the Soviet Union. We were in the Eastern Block, which was dominated by the Sovie Union of course. Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltic states were the westernmost part of the USSR and Hungary has a border with Ukraine.
For some time now i've played with an idea for a book. A book that would be long and hard to read through. But the person that would pick it up would perhaps, at some point, feel my struggles of writing it and join me on that path. Thank you for this video :)
As always, thank you so very much for the work you do. I was wondering, have you ever considered doing an essay on pain? I often share your work with family members, friends, coworkers, or anyone in need of comfort, commiseration, or contemplation. Your videos have quite often been the catalyst for group gatherings and discussion, and in one recent meeting one person mentioned the struggles we all have with pain and our need various attempts to escape rather than embrace it. I'd love to see what you might make of the subject. Or if there are previous videos in your backlog you'd recommend. Thanks again!
Thank you for this beautiful work and also for putting into words my feelings about Tarr's films I never was able to express. I watched all the films in the comfort of my living room, as you did. There's heaviness and poetry and I, many times, ended the films crying (as in Turin's Horse). My question, and perhaps a project, though it would be difficult to materialise, is how these marvellous films 'feel' in a big screen. Satantango is my favourite, and its duration and the rituals of watching it, as you so well observed, have a weight to the final physical and intellectual 'witnessing' of it. I wonder how it would be to get out of the house, walk to the cinema and spend more than seven hours ... 💘
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Had to replace the earlier comment.-- I HIGHLY suggest to you an Anime series called "Girls Last Tour" for something that will stay with you.
It is about two teen-aged girls navigating a Post-Apocalyptic setting where the dreadful truth of it all, while subtle, is so monstrous that any hero we are familiar with would have lost their minds very quickly... but not these two little heroins. They were born into a world with no hope, but they face it with the kind of simple grace & dignity that makes you glad.... glad that these two were the final representation of Humanity.
You'll see.
The "problem" with your videos is that they're so good that they make me want to stop and go watch the film to try to get at least a drop of what you show and say.
That's how great you are!
(but I keep watching them to the end)
ah the hypocritical anti nationalist bela tarmac who opens his door to anyone and never locks it lol
Your conclusion reminds me so much of the cinematography of Lars Von Tries, a same ineffable quality, grounded in a sense of humanity.
Thanks for your work.
I'm Hungarian. There was a screening of Sátántangó in Budapest and a friend of mine got excited and told all his friends to come and see it together if anybody wants to. I didn't go, and i hate myself for it ever since, because as they sat down (it was a small theatre, 50 seats max) right before the movie started in walks Béla Tarr, says how grateful he is that people came to watch his movie, said a couple of words about the movie, and "enjoy!" He left the room, and the movie started. :)
@ruukaoz
I'm really sorry, 😱I don't want to be in your place for a second.
God gave you great directors, Gabor Body, bela tarr, Miklos jancso, sazbo ...
I saw that movie here in the UK, in Leeds. In a cinema. It was a pretty interesting experience. Far too long a movie though.
I felt your pain, sorry man.
"the one day you skip school" ahh scenario
Well done 👏
As a native Hungarian, I have to say that these films capture not only the essence of "Hungarian-ness," but also "human-ness" at their core. These films are a quiet, gentle slap on the face that make you open your eyes and wake up to (an unpleasant) reality we usually prefer to pretend not to see.
As a human, you are not a hungarian
@@je-freenorman7787
What I mean is that the universal ("human-ness") is expressed through the specific ("Hungarian-ness").
@@kecse you mean the Hun?
Nazis from WW1?
They were Aryans, before being converted to Chrisitanity
@@je-freenorman7787
I suspected that you might be getting at this, but I gave you the benefit of the doubt. My only response is, "He who is without sin cast the first stone."
@@kecse and tomorrow has yet to come.
what of it?
are you in the Holy Roman Empire?
Loneliness is a longing for a connection not only to ourselves but to the world around us , especially in our times of need. It is as if we’re walking the world aimlessly in total darkness without a light in sight. Hoping that someone will find us , hold our hand , bring us home and wrap us in a warm blanket of togetherness . We want a safe space for our vulnerabilities, a place where we can take our shoes off and not worry if we muddy the rug. A hug that reaches to the depths of our inner child and brings fourth a glimmer of hope that everything will be ok and to know that someone will walk beside us as we journey into the sun until we are ready for them to become a shadow behind us …. ( Home)
Thank you.
@@karl2851 you’re welcome.
Bro I am screenshoting this and writing it down word for word and giving it to this hot emo chick I want to bang so she thinks I'm deep and philosophical. Thank you man.
Lovely! And spot on
Understood
I remember watching the The Turin Horse one night and just being completely and utterly entranced by it. The one shot scenes of the daughter walking some 5 minutes through the valley to get water from the well each morning, the sequences of them eating their daily ration of one potato in complete silence, the musical cadence that plays throughout the entirety of the film just becomes hypnotizing. Stunning direction and cinematography, you’re just watching characters react to their surroundings without the need for almost any words or dialogue. It’s certainly a film you’ll likely never see replicated.
Sounds like the "slice of life" genre, where there's no real story to tell. It's just a look into a life and world that is not your own.
I was legitimately just researching Bela Tarr last week, and now this. Synchronous indeed.
I was thinking of how all “movies” are a template nothing more. Opening TH-cam this morning and within the first few minutes the line “until someone is out side of the norm do you feel friction” hooked me.
@@Ribo138 I've also been reading a lot of Philip K. Dick and I think synchronous things start to happen to you when you read PKD
I was illegitimately doing the same.
It's not synchronicity....google is watching you 😉😆
@@thejamnasium6447 Enjoy. He’s great
One other thing to consider is just how incredibly cinematic Tarr's films are. His cinematic approach to film making highlights his humanistic philosophy in that all human beings deserve dignity. Tarr gives each of the characters in his film the chance to inhabit a beautiful work of art, as if to say "Yes, this person might be "ugly", but life, no matter how bleak, is still worthy of dignity and is beautiful in its own way". And then just to drive the point home, he allows the audience to spend so much time with each of these characters because he not only wants us to see their worth and their dignity despite the grime and sadness, but also to LIVE and FEEL their worth and value as human beings. He doesn't let us just take a quick look at his characters, he demands we live with them and in the process come to empathize with them.
Well said. Tarr is very insistent.
I think the long cuts serve a very practical purpose. Processing emotions is like pouring water on the soil. You can only do so much actively, but in the end, you have to give it time to soak in. All these cuts are very monotone and you can analyze the scene all you want, you run out of it and the cut still goes on, and your brain switches to idle mode. That's exactly when the subconscious processing begins. So he doesn't let them wash away at surface level, doesn't relieve you, he patiently makes you wait until it's all soaked into your very core. If you let that happen, they will haunt/awe you for many years.
Life is cruel, painful, cold, unjust and bleak, yet people will do anything to survive.
And live, even. When survival is secured.
Haven’t watched the video yet, but OH MY GOD. You’re arguably my favorite video essayist on TH-cam for the soulfulness and the existential themes of your writing and your approach. And Bela Tarr is my favorite filmmaker of all time.
I can’t believe this is happening 😭😭
You sound like such a gay reddit white boy
I'm so happy you made a video on Béla Tarr. Above all "The Turin Horse" is one of my favorite movies and for me one of the true masterpieces of 21th century cinema!
It absolutely blew me away when I saw it at the Chicago Film Festival the year of its release
So happy that you address Bela Tarr. The Turin horse and Satantango are most of the most gorgeous black and white movies ever. They are super underrated and sometimes difficult to get. But oh so beautiful…
This consideration of Bela Tarr exists within the context of the Hungary that Bela Tarr grew up in: The transition from Soviet domination & control of communal farms and the "cap" the Soviets kept by keeping ethnic tensions below the surface by a police force that all suddenly evaporated at the collapse of Soviet rule and was followed by chaotic mismanagement and random acts of petty ethnic violence. The experience of sitting in a theater and viewing a Tarr film on a big screen (as he intended) is rare, it only happens at a University Art Museum context doing a Tarr retrospective. The beauty and cinematic skill of black and white cinema and its dynamics of extremely intentional moving tracking shots that follow person(s) through spaces and landscapes & the faces of non trained actors who are all Tarr's friends that express the real beauty and dignity of the people of Hungary who get "pegged" as what the artist Kathe Kollwitz called "the down-trodden" appear in Tarr's expertise of filmmaking expressing human dignity more immediate and raw than any other appearance in the history of cinema. The "Turin Horse" is set in Northern Hungary in the late 1890's when the entire region was devastated by extreme drought that lasted over 5 years. It was an area of Eastern Europe without theinfrastructure of water and power. Well water was how the people survived, and when that dried up we get to experience that via Tarr's cinematic vision. You got it right when focusing on Tarr's intentional expression of "human dignity".
@@Hugatree1 It is repeated or reset as has been in the past. Problem is that greed takes over those that take the lead after those that survive chaos rise from the ashes. All that is left is there for the taking and from there everything else can only be conquered from that point forward. The family in America is put into competition within one another as in multiple children and the college madness. Children must find a passion or love of something and make that a career regardless of money. That person needs no alarm clock. The money will come along with being the best at what you do and love. Its pure. The corporation is anything but pure well just pure profits and the love of that greed. Modern Humanity is a failure...A pure failure. And nuclear energy is the ultimate reason why when the power goes down even earth as a whole will burn for it. That moment fast approaches as I type this comment. Best of luck to you.
@@jukee67 There is no utopia. Capitalism, communism, or any hybrid will never be perfect.
@@jukee67 Well said. And another part of this tragic circumstance is the chronic impatience and forgetfulness that is exponentially growing in the United States and Americanized modern society. As a person from Ireland with a strong connection to the deep dark part of my soul, I am extremely familiar with the work of the Irish playwright Samuel Beckett. I have watched his play Waiting for Godot at least 10 times.
Yet probably less than one in 100,000 Americans have probably heard of him, let alone seen his works. I would say the same regarding the works of Ingmar Bergman and Akira Kurosawa.
Here is an odd truth: there are more than 2.5 million ants to every human being on planet Earth.
Humanity's egoic, hubris ridden sense of importance ironically denigrates the strange, suffering wonder of being human, as well as the rich complexity of the biodiverse Earth of which we are a part.
If we could accept that our being conscious, SENTIENT beings AUTOMATICALLY involves SUFFERING, we might go a long way to adjusting to the existential reality of being on planet earth.
Unfortunately, I am one that does not see this version of human society lasting more than another 100 years or so.
It is simply not sustainable.
About the 1890s. The Austro-Hungarian Empire built up the fourth-largest machine-building industry in the world, after the United States, Germany and the United Kingdom.[8] Austria-Hungary also became the world's third-largest manufacturer and exporter of electric home appliances, electric industrial appliances, and power generation apparatus for power plants, after the United States and the German Empire,[9] and it constructed Europe's second-largest railway network, after the German Empire.
I also suggest to watch the housing conditions and lifestyle of English working class, the average people of England, it was not better.
I've been watching your programs for a few years now. I want to express to you how much they have have sharpened my understanding of filmography, and how they have unlocked the hidden beauty these films contain. I think your are a treasure. Your fan forever.
Werckmeister Harmonies has one of the most remarkable openings I have ever seen. This is a very profound video essay about Tarrs work.
The opening is great, but the monologue of the protagonist's uncle about the Harmonies is the highlight of the film. Sadly, that's the last vital scene in the entire film until the hospital scene and its use of silhouettes.
If ya like the work, check out its source material. It's based on a novel by the title of The Melancholy of Resistance by Laszlo Krasznahorkai. He's a great writer.
Incredible video. I had the chance to see "Satantango" in a movie theatre in a VERY cold night. I walked for hours trough the city after that. I never been so imersed in something in my whole life. It took months for this dreadfull feeling of my scale in the cosmos to leave me. Best film ever made in my view.
You are like the Werner Herzog of TH-cam, the depth and soulfulness of your videos are amazing.
Also, like Herzog, even when you're talking about the bleakest of matters I still find your voice so soothing.
Just discovered your channel by searching for movies to watch 2022 edition and this was my second video after I finished the first one. I have to admit that generally I don't enjoy watching movie reviews because they lack a deeper meaning and sensibility, but you are such a great storyteller. I almost felt like in a movie theater for 37 min straight.
I've never heard of this man before but I do appreciate the passion that you put into this.
It's worth reading the Krasznahorkai novels behind two of the three Tarr films you mention; they require a disciplined attention but are not as demanding as one might be led to expect from the films. Krasznahorkai's life-philosophy is not Tarr's, but the bleak luminosity of Tarr's films resonates with the apocalyptic style of the source-material.
Also, the Werckmeister Harmonies soundtrack (especially "Old") is well worth a listen on its own.
I've only read Satantango, but it definitely complemented the experience, philosophically and even visually. Seriously the best written depictions of rain, wind, and darkness I've ever read
Thank you so much for an introduction to this genius I was unaware of. I work in film and am currently struggling to assist the director with post production editing issues. I’m also a fine artist and a gallery owner in LA working on a large body of art. I’ve shifted into monotonous work and the cinematic grey he filmed in has further validated my desire to continue painting this work. Bravo to you Sir!
I've only watched the wonderful "Turin Horse" and two hours of "Satantango", ten years ago. Mu strongest impression was I was less watching a film, than living inside it, sharing the lives of those people.
In the art of filmmaking I know of no one who compares to Bela Tarr. We can trace him some precursorr, like Bresson, Bergman or Tarkovsky, but Tarr is not reducible to any of them, he is truly an original.
This is a wonderful, insightful documentary, done with absolute sincerity and love without being pompous. One of the best online docs on a film maker I've ever seen and it's absolutely certain I'll watch The Turin horse.
The first film from Bela Tara I saw was Werckmeister Harmonies. I'm about an hour into Satantango (I like your idea of watching it all in one sitting). I honestly don't remember many of the details from the story of Werckmeister Harmonies, only how it made me feel. And to me what comes across is how, as humans, we always try so hard to survive-no matter how bleak and desperate things are. Even knowing that things are likely going to get worse and feel more bleak-we can't help but push forward... we do what we must to survive the next moment, and the next as best we can.
YESSS. Loving seeing Bela Tarr get more recognition through channels like this, some great things have come of the internet
The story of Nietzsche's breakdown closely resembles Raskolnikov's nightmare in Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment. I wonder if Tarr was trying to reference both of these great thinkers in one go.
Another masterful video essay. Watching the timelapse footage of Tom watching Satantango reminded me of my own home viewing of the nearly 3½ hour _Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles_ some years back. I was somewhat proud of myself that I watched it straight through, without so much as a bathroom break. Of course, at less than half the length of Satantango, it was maybe not so heroic a feat. One of these days, perhaps, I'll get around to watching Tarr's epic...
Excellent analysis of Tarr's work. Worth to mention that most of Tarr's movies are based on novels and stories of the Hungarian writer, Laszlo Krasznahorkai (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A1szl%C3%B3_Krasznahorkai). Tarr and Krasznahorkai have been entangled in a extraordinarily creative way.
As a hungarian i heard only the director's name here and there, however this video make me to watch these fascinating piece of cinemart. Its odd (and sad?) that i had to meet with these informations on an foreign youtube channel. Thank you, LSO.
Fantastic! Beautifully done, I really appreciate the care with which you made this.
Beautifully presented and articulated. Thank you.
Saw The Turin Horse when I was 20, preparing to go into art university. I don´t think I will ever recover from the experience of watching this movie.
Your channel popped up unexpectedly- I have never heard of this fiilmaker - but I watched right to the end your incredibly well-researched and beautifully narrated video - this is the sort of filmmaker I have been searching for - thank you so much - all the best from Melbourne Australia - Mike
By far the best video essay I've seen on Tarr.
Absolutely lovely video - just the sort of intro an absolute beginner who knows nothing of Tarr can watch to help ease their way into his work, yet insightful enough for seasoned viewers to find something new. Convinced me it's time to bite the bullet and watch Satantango. Incidentally, you have a great face for B & W. Good bet many who watch will probably fall in love with you.
this is an excellent video essay about Bela Tarr - I love your contextualization, interpretations, and insights. Thank you for making this work.
I love you. Thanks for this. Tarr really carried on Tarkovsky's sublime work on the use of unbroken time to love by way of seeing(my own very subjective experience.) Thank you for touching on all the aspects of Tarr. The multiplicity of his art.
I wasn't familiar with this director. Thank you for bringing him to my attention. I look forward to discovering his works.
3:00 Not once in my entire life I have ever felt "accomplished" by watching a movie I didn't enjoy to the end and I can't say I understand this mindset. Whenever I watch a movie I didn't like till the end all I feel is that I wasted my time and the longer the film was, the more I regret watching it. Can't imagine sitting through almost a full day of work of a movie I didn't enjoy and feeling "accomplished".
I think that Tarr tried through feature and shot length to allow the movie to impose its own temporality upon the viewer in a much more invasive way than usual. I see it as a deliberate effort to bring about a spatial reconstruction in the viewer's mind. Thereby drawing one into the distances and times associated to his movie's landscapes. One consequence of this is a detachment from the expectations tied to narrative structure and the rules of storytelling as the viewer is much more closely bound to the same temporality as the characters and objects on screen, which I feel drives to a greater focus on the setting.
If, as Tarkovsky puts it, a director is "sculpting in time" then him and Tarr through it definitely created a distinct space in our minds. A "moviescape" around which the viewer's entire temporality must revolve, as you showed in your montage.
Anyway, another great and challenging essay. Thank you.
I saw Werckmeister Harmonies in film class at UNC and it blew my friggin' mind. It was a course on the opposite of Hollywood cinema and this one really stuck with me. I had no idea films could be so.....incroyable. Changed my entire perspective on film and what it could be. The long takes, the length of the movie, the setting, the bleakness & isolation, I think about it often still 10 years on. Just incredible.
Thank you for this. Love your work. I also watched Satantango about eight years ago, and the same year I read Infinite Jest; so I can totally relate to what you said about that feeling of accomplishment from finishing such works of art; almost physically draining. What you said in the end made me think of Gilles Deleuze's writings on cinema and what constitutes the viewing experience as such. Might be interesting to you! So glad that I found your channel. Blessings from Sweden!
I found Jest through great enthusiasm, shared and celebrated, animated with wide eyes over spilled drinks in Hanoi bars, physically igniting. Twice read, put a gallop in the step of my perceptions.
@@ro55reel5 You read it with others? In like a book circle? I will probably read it again someday. I think I could appreciate the nuances more these days. And I would say DFW:s dystopic future has been all but realized by now, at least when it comes to the prevading mentality in the culture, our tendency toward isolation and comfort in the form of entertainment, drugs or delusion.
@@FriAnde92 ah no book circle, was lucky to be around a few people who were enjoying the book at the same time. Yes I agree, the entertainment has many of us catatonic.
Tom I'm incredibly happy to see you return to a more philosophical video once again, whilst I enjoy your videos on intricacies of filmmaking, I adore your videos that touch upon philosophy and human nature
Truly remarakble analysis, thank you!
There are different schools of cinema and the factors can be many, for example geographical, cultural, historical and influential cinematographers of the past. We can see in his work Bergman, Tarkovsky, even characteristics of New Wave. Of course we the film lovers appreciate old school cinema, therefore thanks for your wonderful work 🙏❤️🎞
Bela Tarr was described in a Guardian article in 2000, along with directors such as Pedro Costa, Sharunas Bartas, and Fred Kelemen (also dp of two Tarr movies), as "rare, rejected but vital castaway directors." By the time of The Turin Horse, Tarr was much better known and quite revered. The style of filmmaking employed by Tarr and others, of long takes, bleak settings, often non-professional actors had, over the previous decade also become more common, admired, and seen to be worth borrowing, at least partially. Director Steve McQueen is also mentioned in the article. At this point he is still a museum installations artist; he is mentioned because he brought screenings of Bartas's films to London.
It's interesting to me how Tarr went from being overlooked for over a decade following Damnation, then rose to a prominence that he deserved, saw his influence disseminate widely and elements of his style be frequently employed. Then he retired, and his style of filmmaking became again an only occasionally seen, marginal pursuit. Satantango dropped 42 places on the Sight and Sound critics' poll, while an alternative long-take movie 'Jeanne Dielmann...' was promoted to first place.
I've only watched Werckmeister Harmonies and The Turin Horse. I really like Gus Van Sant's Tarr-inspired trilogy of death films, Gerry, Elephant and Last Days. The cinematography of those films, plus Sofia Coppola's supposedly 'Jeanne Dielmann...' inspired Somewhere, all shot by Harris Savides, is some of the best in cinema.
On another note, a subject in cinema that has preoccupied me for a while is the compare and contrast--the idea of the continuities and innovations--between the traditional Modernist art cinema of European masters such as Fellini, Bergman, Antonioni, Bresson, Tarkovsky, Herzog, Fassbinder (and the above Guardian article mentions Hungarian Miklos Jansko) and the later cinema of filmmakers like Tarr, Haneke, Claire Denis, Bruno Dumont, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Cristian Mungiu, Sergei Loznitsa and Andrei Zwagnitsev (and perhaps several Asian directors, Tsai, Jia, Apichatpong). This subject is very much akin to the question you pose in this video: how and/or why are Tarr's films different from Bergman, Tarkovsky and Malick's? They don't evince a faith in God, as the films of those directors do. Is that all?
Cinematography in Tarr's movies surely owes something to Tarkovsky's. But in a certain respect Tarr is at the antipodes of the russian. In Tarkovsky's films there is a lot of melancholy, but also a longing for hope, while in Tarr thereis only bleakness and despair. Feelings btw that are not very Nietzschean, since Nietzsche hated and feared nihilism. The Nietzschean message of eternal return means you must accept and love life as it is, to the point of wishing that your life (with all its pains and joys) would repeat itself eternally.
@@dagerman7032 I've only seen two Tarr movies, but I don't think there is only bleakness and despair in them, but rather both Werckmeister Harmonies and The Turin Horse evoke autonomous cinematic worlds containing a diversity of things and a range of characters. Yes, the trajectory of each film's narrative is towards a kind of apocalypse, but so is Tarkovsky's The Sacrifice.
Yes, to your point about Nietzsche. It is not me who's saying that Tarr's films are a Nietzschean vision. The Turin Horse is surely a rejoinder to what Krasznahorkai and Tarr view as Nietzsche's effeteness and hypertrophied intellectualness. In place of this affliction which resulted in his terminal breakdown following the incident with the horse, they propose the example and worldview of the horse's peasant owners. Eating boiled potatoes after the lights have gone out, unto the end of the world. There is obviously a hopefulness underpinning their rough-hewn, extremely common-sensical existence.
@@lorcan545 You're probably right that it's not all bleakness and despair in Tarr. Actually, I was thinking mostly of Turin Horse. My remark about Nietzsche was not directed at you, but at the author of the video, who passes the erroneous idea that Nietzsche was a nihilist, when in fact Nietzsche sought more than anything to escape the nihilism of a world without god nor purpose.
Wow! I just stumbled onto this clip. What a visionary Bela Tarr must have been. I feel as though I just discovered a small box of treasures hidden in a hole in a tall dead oak tree. It's the middle of the night in the dead of winter and I am afraid to open the box and sift through the treasures for fear of cutting my hands to shreds. And yet, I know I will but not tonight. Tonight I will content myself with listening to Chopin and recalling the images of Nazi atrocities and marvel at that glorious interaction between exquisite art and the bitterness of reality men are so capable of producing simultaneously. I'll be back.
No whale has ever haunted me like the whale in Werkmeister. As a lover of bleak weather, I enjoy watching Tarr’s bleak movies. Thank you for posting this wonderful look into a great and daring filmmaker.
This really helped me remember Nietzsche’s ideas and how subtly transformative cinema can be thank you
Really nice video! Great choice of filmmaker to focus on and great deep dive into Tarr's works!
Beautiful video. I remember when I watch Satantango : I prepare some food, turn off my phone and cut internet. It was a great experience. I wish I saw the film in a theatre. Another similar experience was watching live The Third Day - Autumn. It was 12h I think. All shot live and broadcasted on Facebook.
I love your documentaries about films. They are some of the best I have ever seen.
I never heard of Belá Tarr before, but I will definitely sold it to me. Thanks for your amazing work as always.
I've only seen one Tarr film, The Turin Horse, which I though was excellent. I'm looking forward to exploring his films with the new box set from Curzon!
Thank you so much for this essay, it's really wonderful. You've done a very good job and your analysis is great. I like a lot the part about Nietzsche. From a Bela Tarr's fan ;)
I'm glad you cleared up the "God Is Dead' quote....everyone leaves off the second part of the quote..."And We Killed Him"...
Superb video. I knew nothing about Tarr. Thank you
😮a face to the voice. Always makes a shock.
I've almost finished Santango and I absolutely adore the long slow takes
I watched this movie 2 years ago I just did not anticipate the effect on me. I liked it but it is not like I was really entertained. I still remember it and what I felt during the film vividly.
A gutteral awe.
I think after hearing about the eternal recurrence dozens of times, this is the first time I really understand the meaning, from your thoughts in this video. Great essay!
Thanks for the video. Totally forgot about Bella Tarr. I remember seeing Wrekmeister Harmonies at the NYCFF many years ago. Definitely challenged my view on how narratives in films “should” be constructed. I think the Daniels (directors) today are also motivated to break down this collective movie logic as well.
Loved your essay. Piqued my interest in Tarr. Nice touch filming your bits in B&W.
As much as I loath the corporate centralization of information and the for profit algorithmic approach to the internet I still find things that are worth wild that prevent me from disregarding these platforms regardless of how i feel about them in an ideological sense. Great Video.
Man, what a video, thank you so much!
I cannot thank you enough for this. but thank you.
12:25 - Yep, been reading Nietzsche for years now. Almost always something new to find every time you pick up his work, whether it's because your perspective has changed, or because you didn't fully take in the density (between the lines), and/or as you mentioned, volatile writing. I'm at the point where I'm starting to see some of the contradictions in his work, which is very interesting.
I was wondering about this. And thinking about the writer in broad scope, for me, there is a different, jubilant, jokester Nietzsche, like the voice in Ecce Homo.
Wow! thank you so much for this video. As an author of nordic crime, Béla Tarr is now definitely on my list to study.
just had the channel recommended, not disappointed.
thank you for the upload.have a like.
Im utterly blown away by the quality of this video.
Huge Bela fan here. Thank you so much for making this video. I enjoyed it beginning to end, thank you so so much! New subscriber now! ❤
20:37 _"It's a rather poetic description, but what I think he's really proposing here is not so much a scientific perspective on the objective nature of reality; he's not literally suggesting that our lives are replayed on an endless loop; it's not a commentary on determinism or individual agency. Rather, it's more of a thought experiment in which he tries, like Tarr does in his films, to force us to truly regard our world and our existence as it is, and to find meaning in what we directly know and experience. This obviously means to discard all escapes into faith, in which life tends to be seen as a passage towards something else, be it reincarnation, heaven, or some other spiritual realm; and in which meaning tends to be handed down from above, or from beyond what we know. But, in a way, the concept of eternal recurrence also goes beyond more atheist perspectives by denying us the escape into death as well. In other words, in our quest for meaning and our general understanding of what it means to be human, we cannot appeal to any form of external resolution - not even oblivion. And so, what eternal recurrence really implies is a radical grounding in the here and now, an imagined fate to make us question who we would be, how we would act, if all there ever was and will be was_ this; _no guiding stars, no salvation, no escape."_
intimacy and connection. distant and disenfranchised
Another element of Tar's style is to let the camera linger awhile after the action is finished.
I will first watch the movies before watching your analysis. You have enticed me enough. Thanks for introducing a filmaker like him!
I feel like you will have a story for Andor. The 12th episode and funeral march... and what led toward that. What I've heard is that Andor, as a series, started as the idea of the funeral march... was written out from there.
In the meantime, I love your stories and videos.
A perfect day for a new release. Thank you for your work.
I was a little sceptical before I saw it. I'm pretty allergic to arty/quasi-intellectual works of any kind and there are so many poseurs, but this wasn't that at all. You don't need an ongoing symbolism analysis or extensive knowledge of anything to get sucked into the most oppressive atmosphere imaginable in a film. It's simply incredibly well crafted and I found it baffling and exhilarating in all its gloominess.
I didn't know much about Nietzsche at the time. Now I know a little more, enough to not have to spell check his name, but at the time all I really focused on was the idea that this must be the time when God had drawn his last breath and the world was indeed going to hell. Not with a Hollywood bang, or a theological drama, but simply with the heaviest of nihilistic sighs; dust, emptiness and release. That's how I remember it anyway. I loved it and I have been saving up a review for over a decade. My name is Ozymandias.
Your parents named you after a breaking bad episode?!😲🤯 Crazy.🥶🔥💯😎😩
@@Maciekk_ "I met a traveller from an antique land, Who said- “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand, Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
- Shelley 1817
@@QualeQualeson Damn, parents of this king must really love breaking bad❤️❤️❤️🤖🥵🤯🤯💯💯🔥
@@QualeQualeson do you really think there are many poseurs and quasi-intellectual works out there? I don't really see that as an extensive problem, at least not in the past 20 years, not when I can stream nearly anything I want. Of course, I'm pretty isolated and out of touch nowadays
@@squirlmy Well, poseurs... depends on where you're looking. But speaking on film, I think you're right in that there are fewer now. Just my impression. I think that to some extent the mighty have fallen, French pop cultural "intellectuals" and so on. Though they certainly still exist, they're not cheered on by the elite so much anymore and they're typically representing the opposite of what's being put on screen. The whole thing has shifted considerably.. there are so many aspects. Like for example theatre and literature influencing film making to a much greater degree than now. Everything has become dumber, but also less full of itself, at least intellectually speaking (PC/identitity culture is certainly also full of itself but in a very different way). It's an interesting, but also very big topic. A long discussion poorly suited to this format. But yes, I'm inclined to agree with you.
In his book, The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis describes a Hell that is surprisingly similar to what is depicted in these films. Rather than a pit of fire, he depicts it as a dreary, endless and meaningless existence in which you're continually subjected to petty conflicts with others.
wow! thanks, love the visuals! will go deeper into his work.
the philosophy goes way over my head though but i'm used to that.
I think it best to view his films
backwards to forwards in extreme slow motion. Then
the meaning will be more
easily discerned.
Can you please do a video talking about the sight and sound I would love to hear what you think about it
Thanks for posting about this film, I'll remember watching this film but I don't get the meaning or message they want to tell, this is beautifuly presented and articulate thank you.
Bela Tarr, really an epic film maker 🎥
Remember growing up, there used to be a running joke about eastern-european movies, that theyre always were depressing and in black and white. Nowdays Ive come to appreciate the style a lot and even find myself enjoying (if thats the right word for it) the tone, style, tempo and themes. Appreciate your take on it immensly, good work.
Simpsons did it? SNL maybe?
Wreckmeister Harmonies is the least-depressing / easily-the-best Bela Tarr film.
@@HenrySosenite I said it was a "running joke", not the objective truth.
I know this video was a lot of work to make and I appreciate it. thank you!
Fantastic video essay. Thank you for the time and effort put into making this
Your work is very beautiful and does a wonderful job at exemplifying the cinema you cover. I love you
Thank you for your insights to one of my favorite directors, and his films.
I will never forget the experience of watching this FILM, my first encounter with Bela Tar was like Janus's encounter with a whale, absolute illusion.
These videos are so profound and encouraging.
Loved this! In an odd way it reminds of me Hidetaka Miyazaki games (Elden Ring, Dark Souls, ...)
Thanks for this briefly simple video essay.
Just one correction: Hungary was never part of the Soviet Union. We were in the Eastern Block, which was dominated by the Sovie Union of course. Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltic states were the westernmost part of the USSR and Hungary has a border with Ukraine.
His primary camera angle of cutting off the top makes everything claustrophobic, stymies any sense of possibility, escape or transcendence.
For some time now i've played with an idea for a book. A book that would be long and hard to read through. But the person that would pick it up would perhaps, at some point, feel my struggles of writing it and join me on that path.
Thank you for this video :)
As always, thank you so very much for the work you do. I was wondering, have you ever considered doing an essay on pain? I often share your work with family members, friends, coworkers, or anyone in need of comfort, commiseration, or contemplation. Your videos have quite often been the catalyst for group gatherings and discussion, and in one recent meeting one person mentioned the struggles we all have with pain and our need various attempts to escape rather than embrace it. I'd love to see what you might make of the subject. Or if there are previous videos in your backlog you'd recommend. Thanks again!
I like the clips shown in this video, very haunting.
I can't explain why this film affects me as it does. I know the story of Nietzsche and the horse. Thank you for this.
Thank you for this beautiful work and also for putting into words my feelings about Tarr's films I never was able to express. I watched all the films in the comfort of my living room, as you did. There's heaviness and poetry and I, many times, ended the films crying (as in Turin's Horse). My question, and perhaps a project, though it would be difficult to materialise, is how these marvellous films 'feel' in a big screen. Satantango is my favourite, and its duration and the rituals of watching it, as you so well observed, have a weight to the final physical and intellectual 'witnessing' of it. I wonder how it would be to get out of the house, walk to the cinema and spend more than seven hours ... 💘