SZIGET A SZARAZFOLDON

A strange old woman keeps on interrupting someone who is giving a speech to the amusement of the audience. When she was young she visited the town that the man is talking about with her father, a captain in the navy. This old woman dresses elegantly and a bit out of style. She likes to put on a youthful attitude. She lives alone in an apartment full of memories, knickknacks, and photographs. It is whispered about that her apartment is too big for just one person. She does not want to be forced to leave the neighborhood, so she seeks, in vain, someone in the same building with whom she can exchange apartments. She therefore turns to the semiclandestine market. At the same time, her apartment becomes a pilgrimage site for visitors interested in it. In the end, she finds an apartment that she likes with a quiet garden. The old woman listens to trumpet music from a gramophone and looks at the photographs on the wall and walks about in a solitude that is peopled with memories.

"Sziget a szarazfoldon is not a work of great breath, but it is a beautiful and sincere film done by an artist who is lord over his world of creatures, who introduce themselves with their personalities. […] An alienated person. This is the much-desired formula in the style of the author, Ivan Mandy. It was natural for the director to decide to put his own idea on the desk of a writer like Mandy a move from home to home to give a chance to show concisely the life and character of the protagonist. Mandy was able to create a personal, flowing, and elevated atmosphere around this type of plot. The film comes closest to its own potential right where it bears witness to the talent of the director in the most convincing way, where it finds those 'mandyane' atmospheres." (Otto Hamori, "Filmkultura", 2/1969)

Director: Judit Elek.
Screenplay: Ivan Mandy, da un'idea originale di Judit Elek.
Director of photography: Elemer Ragalyi.
Cast and characters: Manyi Kiss (la vecchia signora).
Production company: MaFilm (Studio 4), Budapest