FENYES SZELEK

The action takes place in 1947. A group of students of a people's college are heading towards a Catholic high school in a little city. The students have organized a discussion in order to spread their convictions as atheists. Laci, their director, does all he can to break the ice and tries to create an atmosphere with songs and dances that would foster the coming together of the two groups. In the meantime, Laci makes friends with Andras, a Catholic high school student whose parents had died in a Nazi concentration camp. A police officer barges in. He is a friend of Laci's, but has an arrest warrant for a group of high school students accused of conspiracy against the State. Laci tries to mediate, but is overawhelmed by the extremism of Teréz and Judit, who are the selfappointed enforcers of the most rigid Manicheism in the running of the college. The members of the central commettee of the people's college arrive and they decide to expel the two women.

"It is easy to establish what the main issue is in the current debate about Hernadi-Jancso's film. In the first place, the clash is about the issue whether the film represents the NÉKOSZ movement faithfully; to put more generically, whether the film faithfully represents the years after the liberation - the period of the 'bright winds'. I cannot be the judge of this because I am convinced that Fényes szelek is not about NÉKOSZ and it is not even a portrait of the years following the liberation. […] In general, Jancso's work is more worthwhile. It examines what happens when the greatest artists of history, the revolutionaries, find themselves face to face with the completed work that was done through them, face to face with the victorious revolution. To be more precise, it is about what happens when revolutionaries find themselves facing a stratum of people who, for one reason or another, do not ask for, do not approve, and cannot accept the revolution." (Laszlo Gyurko, "Népszabadsag", 26/2/1969)

Director: Miklos Jancso.
Screenplay: Gyula Hernadi.
Director of photography: Tamas Somlo.
Art director: Tamas Banovich.
Editor: Zoltan Farkas.
Music: Paul Arma, "Marcia della Brigata Internazionale" di Aladar Komjath. Cast and characters: Andrea Drahota (Judit), Kati Kovacs (Teréz), Lajos Balazsovits (Laci), Benedek Toth (membro della direzione centrale), Andras Balint (Andras), Andras Kozak (ufficiale di polizia), Adrienne Csengery, Jacint Juhasz, Jozsef Madaras.
Production company: MaFilm (Studio 1), Budapest.