>> From the Library of Congress in Washington, D. C.
[ Silence ]
>> Laszlo Rajk, a practicing architect
and production designer is professor in production design
at the University of Theater and Film in Budapest.
He is also known as a former dissident
and human rights activists.
As an architect and freelance artist he became a member
of the Hungarian avant-garde movement in the '70s.
In 1975 he joined the Democratic Opposition,
the underground political movement in Hungary as a result
of which he was blacklisted and was not allowed
to work under his own name.
In 1981 with Gabor Demszky future mayor of Budapest
and former speaker here two months ago he founded the independent,
underground AB Publishing House and ran an illegal bookstore
from his apartment called the "Samizdat Boutique."
In 1988 he was one of the founders of the Network of Free Initiatives
and the liberal party, the Alliance of Free Democrats
and served six years in the Parliament
after the first free elections in 1990.
Since 1972 he has been the production designer
of several Hungarian and international films working
with Bela Tarr, Miklos Jancso, Szabolcs Hajdu, Marta Meszaros,
Peter Gothar, Costa Gavras, John Irvin, Fatih Akin,
Joseph Sargent and Vittorio Storaro.
Since 1992 he has been an associate professor, Department of Theory
and Art at the University of Theater, Film and Television
in Budapest and in 2005 he received doctorate from the Faculty
of Architecture the Budapest University
of Technology and Economics.
If I were to read a list of his awards and honors
and publications we would have no time for his talk.
So all I will say is that there are many.
Right now he is coming to us from Princeton University
where he gave lectures on film and architecture.
It's my pleasure to introduce to you our speaker Dr. Laszlo Rajk.
[Applause]
>> Dr. Laszlo Rajk: Thank you very much for the introduction
and especially thank you very much for the possibility
that I could be here and we'll discuss a little bit what would be
the, how should I say the style of this presentation
and so first we decided or I decided that I would talk a little bit
on art movies as such because they are generally very different
from let's say normal or commercial or Hollywood or whatever movies
but sometimes the structures are very same.
So they are different of in their style, in their camera movement,
in their composition, in the storytelling line, in narratives,
in characters, the problems what they reveal.
So it seems that they are very different but they are not
that different because even
in art movies you have good art movies and bad art movies.
You have boring art movies and exciting art movies
and there are high budget movies.
There are low budget movies so there are all kinds of things.
Why I'm happy to be here, how should I say,
to recruit a little bit the audience of art movie because they need
and I've seen at first to recruit and to see.
I was hesitating, when I got the invitation I was hesitating
to show only one art movie or taking out spots
or parts from different ones.
Finally I decided to do the previous, I mean one art movie,
probably it's a little bit advantage because I work on this art movie,
"The Man of London," "The Man From London" sorry and those I sing
because it's a very heavy one.
It's a very difficult one, so probably those let's say beginners
if you are through this movie you will enjoy all of them but probably
if it's too slow, too boring, too-- just blame me.
It's my mistake, especially it's my mistake
because we can't have the whole movie to show from the beginning
to the end because it's two and a half hours
and we have a shorter time.
So it's what I would like to show you it's [inaudible] storytelling,
how it's developed and camera moves and the visual,
the most typical visual parts of this movie
because it's a very visual movie.
Sometimes the narratives are told by the visual effects,
by the visual parts and not really verbally.
Before we start, one more thing that the script is based
on a crime story of Georges Simenon.
He's a very famous French crime writer, so to say.
It was written in '35, '36, I mean 1935, '36.
It was very successful.
It was the same title, "L'Homme de Londres", "The Man from London"
and it got several publications.
The last publication, the last edition, sorry, the last edition was
at the premier of Bela Tarr's movie, "The Man From London"
and the cover page was my design on the cover page and I'm very proud
of it and it's my book in a way and the movie got nominated
in Cannes, in Festival of Cannes.
It had success and Tarr has a very special audience who are diverse.
He has kind of fan clubs kind of everywhere, New York and Tokyo
and Paris and Budapest but those, how should I say,
the members of those fan clubs are not very numerous but they are,
so just a small introduction before we start.
The first part is going to be a kind of a long part of the movie.
It explains a little bit the situation where we are starting from
and it really gives the essence of the style of the movie.
Lots of film historians telling-- it was released in 2007, the movie
and a lot of film historians telling
that this first shot is going to be infamy in history.
It's such an outstanding in aesthetics,
in narratives by all means.
The story takes place originally in Dieppe.
That's a harbor town in France and why it was very interesting for me
as an architect and why it was beside it was an honor to work
with Bela it was interesting to design it
because the crime story takes place in space,
so it's 3-dimensional which is very rare.
Generally, crime stories it could be Agatha Christie
or anyone else is like a chessboard.
The actors or the protagonist are moving always in 2-dimensional
and you don't have a third in connection which is very important.
The third dimension you will see right
at the beginning it's very important.
Our protagonist has a position that he could look,
he could observe everything from an elevated point of view
and you will see that why it is important
because he witnesses all kinds of things.
Given this fact that it's three-dimensional at the beginning
or in the preparation period we wanted to find some kind
of a model we could work and which would emphasize this
three-dimensional model and finally we found a strange model that's
"Dante's Divina Commedia, The Inferno"
and so the movie is somehow structured according
to the first six, seven circles of "Dante's Inferno"
and before each part I'm going to tell you where they are
at the moment, so I would suggest to see the first part is going
to be something like 23, 25 minutes as far as I remember.
[ Music ]
[ River Flowing ]
>> Don't follow me too soon.
>> Okay.
>> Wait two minutes.
>> I'll wait until you disappear.
Don't worry.
Be careful.
>> I will.
[ River Flowing ]
[ Click of cigarette lighter followed by footsteps ]
[ Background sounds ]
[ Sound of something splash in the water ]
[ Background sounds ]
[ Train door closes ]
[ Approaching footsteps ]
[ Whistle blown ]
[ Train moving down tracks ]
[ Click of machine handle ]
[ Footsteps ]
[ River flowing ]
[ Voice in the distance ]
>> Get your stinking hands off me.
[ Sounds of a struggle ]
[ Man screams then falls into water ]
[ River Flowing ]
[ Footsteps ]
[ Music playing faintly ]
[ Footsteps on a ladder ]
[ River Flowing and splashing ]
[ Music ]
[ Distant Church bell ringing ]
[ Bird sounds ]
[ Music ]
>> Salud.
>> Salud.
[ Music ]
>> Laszlo Rajk: I think it's right to agree
that it's a very special style.
It's a very special narrative.
It's almost without words.
We can learn a very complicated story
and we all understand what the situation is.
Before going on I think I should have introduced those people
who made the movie.
First of all Bela Tarr, who is the director,
cinematographer is Fred Kelemen from Germany.
The great help of the director and for me
as well beside she is the editor Agnes Hranitzky,
writer is Laszlo Krasznohorkai based on the novel of Simenon,
Georges Simenon and music is Mihaly Vig sorry, which is one could say
that it's also very important.
Before going on I think it's not really necessary however,
I would say that one could learn that this man, our protagonist,
Maloin who is sitting on this tower, in his tower high up,
it's over the edge of this inferno that I was talking
about but it's always night.
And at the moment when the sun comes up he comes back to our level,
to the inferno which is not a very serious level
so it's not beyond the seven circles, it's just the first six
which is kind of mild sins like laziness, greediness,
these type of sins which is kind of forgettable sins but still belongs
to Dante's final creator so to say.
So our protagonist lives an everyday life.
From the next part we will be sure
that he is always on the night shift.
In the morning he comes down to ground and he goes
for the first shot to the pub, to the cafe and then he goes home
and then he bangs the table with his wife a little bit,
then he gets eat and then he goes to bed.
He closes the shutter of the window so there would not be light
in his room and then in the night it starts from the beginning.
Let's see the next night.
[ Knocking sound ]
[ Water splashing ]
[ Music ]
>> So as we see it's not only that he's witnessing crime from his point
of view but also he's discovered that he's witnessing.
Again, in other words [inaudible] the story and we start to feel
that his life is off the rails
and he cannot continue the vicious circle however vicious
but it's still kind of a stable life and let's see what happens next.
[ Foreign language spoken ]
[ Door opens and shuts]
[ Footsteps ]
[ River flowing ]
[ Foreign language spoken ]
[ River splashing ]
>> So as I told you in our story in the space
where it takes place it has two limits, one the criminal goes
over the crater of the inferno,
the other never goes beyond the seven circles
which is a very short border beyond the role of this.
That's the lower circles of murder, of violence, of killing, etcetera.
We the audience will never go beyond this.
The door is shut in front of us but we know what happens there
and again we know what happened, again without a word
without actually looking at, observing the murder,
the killing we still know what happens
which is a very interesting trick if I may use this word of filmmaking
that our mind somehow adds to the story.
I'm not going to tell the end of the story since it's a crime story
and hopefully you are going to borrow it from the Library
of Congress and you will watch this movie.
If anyone has, I'm almost on time, if anyone has questions please.
Yes?
>> Can you tell us about your work as a production designer
or can you tell us about creating the designs?
>> It's filmed in Bastia, in Corsica which belongs to France.
That's an island and why we were choosing this location
because it could be seen, it was open to the sea
and we have this vast horizon, so to say freedom and hope, etcetera.
There was this big wall.
It circles us into the harbor because of high waves
and I mean practically but visually it was very important for us
that Maloin the figure, our hero is always in this crater
and he never sees the horizon and I personally like,
as production designer but generally my [inaudible] production designer
that something is on the edge of the perception so probably
by the I don't know 13 minutes
or 14 minutes even though the audience releases he could see the
horizon the hole when he's up in his tower but immediately
when there is the possibility light comes up he comes down
and he goes back to this vicious circle.
So this is where the model of Dante came,
"Inferno" otherwise we built everything.
So we built the tower what you saw.
We built the train tracks.
We built the train because there is a very special thing in Corsica.
I'm not getting into details.
We built the ship because the nose of the ship was very low,
so we kind of highered it or made it taller.
We did the-- the cafe was there but of course, I mean the door
but we had to transfer but basically everything was built there in a way
but it looks very natural.
But it's there so the locals I have to tell you that the locals,
when I started the build, especially the train tracks they saw
that I was absolutely crazy and an idiot because I was working alone.
You know the production designer always arrives first to the location
so I was working with locals and they were building everything,
so that beside that we were all decadent, that was the,
how should I say, the [inaudible], some other things
as well, but they were very nice.
It was really it was friendship to work with them.
Yes?
>> Often, when people use like detective novels
in Latin America often it's understood as a political stand,
often a political stand to the left.
Did you see this film talking about that kind of question?
>> No, it talks about one could have of course like it's a good argument
like you have different interpretations.
For example, I've heard in Princeton when I was doing this master class
that money shows the cruelty or criticism of capitalism
which pushes people off their normal life because it's basically money
which finally results that Maloin goes and kills someone.
So for example, that's quite an extreme interpretation
so in a way sometimes it depends much more on the audience
than the will of the director how it's interpreted.
This young man in Princeton he interpreted it like a very,
very serious criticism of capitalism.
Thank you very much for your attention
and I hope you will enjoy if you watch the movie.
Thank you very much.
[Applause]
>> This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress.
Visit us at loc.gov.