HUNKY BLUES: THE AMERICAN DREAM (2009)

3rd Hungarian Film Showcase in London

"Somewhere in the World"
22-28 June 2010

Hunky Blues: The American Dream (2009)

Director: Peter Forgacs

Peter Forgacs is a Hungarian media artist and independent film maker. Since 1978 he made more than 30 films, but he is best known for his "Private Hungary" series of award winning films often based on ordinary lives from 1920s and 80s.

Throughout his career he received several international awards. Among others: 2007 Dutch Erasmus Prize for his notable contributions to European Culture 2000 Grand Prize for The Maelstrom, "Out of the Darkness" International Film Festival, London 2000 The Golden Spire, Golden Gate award, for Angelos' Film, San Francisco International Film Festival 1997 Berlin, Prix Europa for Free Fall film His international debute came with The Bartos Family (1988).

Since 1990s his video installations have been presented at museums and art galleries throughout Europe and America. Between 2000-2002 he was artist in residence in The Getty Museum/Getty Research Institue, Los Angeles where he created The Danube Exodus: Rippling Currents of The River Installation.

His works can be found in several museums and public collections. In 2009 he represented Hungary in the Venice Biennale, exhibiting the Col Tempo- The W. Project installation.

/Source: www.forgacspeter.hu, www.hunkyblues.com/

He created Hunky Blues in 2009.

Producer: Gabor Kovacs
Editor: Peter Sass

Musicians:
Karoly Cserepes - keyboard, percussion;
Bela Agoston - saxophone;
Kalman Balog - cimbalom;
Kalman Bango - glass-cimbalom;
Zoltan Farkas - guitar;
Adam Javorka - viola;
Dodi Karpati - trumpet

"The film is a documentary, exploring the fate of thousands of Hungarians who arrived to the United States between 1890 and 1921,reveals the difficult moments of arrival, integration and assimilation, which eventually fed the happiness of the later generations and their fulfillment of the American Dream."

Forgacs tells the story with found footages, photographs and interviews.

ANIMAL FARM (1954)

3rd Hungarian Film Showcase in London

"Somewhere in the World"
22-28 June 2010

Animal Farm (1954)


Director: John Halas and Joy Batchelor

John Halas was a Hungarian animator who was born in Budapest, 1912. His involvement with animation lead him to work with George Pal. While working and studying in Budapest, Hungary, he's met Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. Halas due to the lack of work at the hungarian studio, accepted a job in Paris where he continued the same studies he had begun in Budapest.
He moved to London in 1936, to complete a production of Music Man (1938), where he met his future wife, Joy Batchelor, who also worked on the film.

First Halas and Batchelor worked as a graphic desing partnership in the pre-war period, they were married in 1940, and in the same year they have founded the Halas and Batchelor studio to make animated advertisements for clients of the J. Walter Thompson agency, such as Kellogs and Lux.

Their work was easily identified by the combination of Disney-style characters and Eastern European aesthetics. During the war Halas and Batchelor worked on public information films for government departments. From 1940 to the late 1950's the studio was firmly associated with the production of propaganda and public information films. Its UK profile was further enhanced with the production of the Charlie-series (1946-47) for the Central Office of Information.

These films were the starting point from which the studio was able embark on its largest production: Animal Farm (1954). (Source and reference: www.ucreative.ac.uk, University for Creative Arts online; www.screenonline.org.uk/people)


"Britain’s first full length Animated feature based on George Orwell’s novel. Animal Farm captures the spirit of Orwell’s timeless political allegory with compassion. A fine example of classic animation, the film remains today as relevant as ever. The story of the animal’s uprising and their inevitable discovery that even amongst themselves some are more equal than others."


Production: John Halas, Joy Batchelor
Direction: John Halas, Joy Batchelor
Script: Joy Batchelor, Philip Stapp, Lothar Wolf
Design: John Halas, Joy Batchelor, Digby Turpin, Bernard Carey
Animation: John Reed, Arthur Humberston, Ralph Ayries, Eddy Radage, Harold Whitaker
Music: Matyas Seiber
(Information source: www.halasandbatchelor.co.uk)