ZOLDAR

In the 1950"s Marton Ostoros leaves his home village for Budapest, where he intends to enroll in medical school. Once he gets to the city, he gets the news that he has been rerouted into the school of French Literature. He goes through a moment of disorientation, but then commits himself to his studies. He mixes in well in student life, makes friends, and finds a girlfriend, but there are many things that he does not manage to understand. For example, he does not understand the way Laszlo Acs behaves. Acs was a friend who, like Marton, had come from the country and who becomes secretary of the school youth association. He is full of exaggerated revolutionary zeal, and even goes so far as to expel Marton's girlfriend from the university because she is guilty of an "unworthy private life." Then, he does not understand the way the Party secretary, whom everyone thinks well of, passively accepts the arrest of Acs without saying a word in his favor. One day his mother visits him unexpectedly. Marton invites her out to a very elegant restaurant, and her noble simplicity helps him see more clearly. So, he decides to return to his village for some time. Even here, he finds himself facing the conflicts that rise out of great economic and social transformations.

"This film speaks the language of the waters, the fountains, and the rivers, with the dialects of the rains, and the slang of the faucets and the showers. This liquid language is not easily understood; but if it is understood, it has a lot to say. [...] This film treats the atmosphere of the early 1950's, the sociopolitical environment that circulated and took root in the consciousness and in the sentiments of the youth. Few films have treated this period in a more poetic way anti with more effective symbolic power. Few films have portrayed the unmistakably recognizable signs of reality in the same way as has Zoldar. It is directed by Istvan Gaal, who wrote the screenplay along with Imre Gyongyossy." (Béla Matrai-Betegh, "Magyar Nemzet", 21/10/1965)

Director: Istvan Gaal.
Screenplay: Imre Gyongyossy, Istvan Gaal.
Director of photography: Miklos Herczenik.
Music: Andras Szollosy.
Cast and characters: Bence Toth (Marton Ostoros), Virag Darab (Bori), Gabor Koncz (Laszlo Acs), Judith Meszléry (Eszter, sua moglie), Istvan Szilagyi (Jakab Nagy), Gyongyvér Demjén (Anci Varga), Mrs. Zipi (madre di Marton), Teri Horvath (Margit, sorella di Marton).
Production company: MaFilm (Studio 4), Budapest.