News

More people buy more expensive tickets to less screenings – this is the short summary of the analysis of Hungarian box office trends of the first half of 2010.

An American gangster starts a business fraud where accidentally two Hungarian workers are also involved, who end up in a chippendale show in England – this is the starting point of one of the biggest Hungarian projects in production this year. The leading roles of Magic Boys are played by Vinnie Jones (known from several Guy Ritchie movies) and Michael Madsen. Experienced comedy director Róbert Koltai has also won major Hungarian stars (Pindroch Csaba, Szabó Győző, Hujber Ferenc) for this film which will speak mainly in English.

Hungarian director Bence Miklauzic has presented his first feature Sleepwalkers in 2002 and since then worked only on short films and documentaries. His second full length feature, Children of the Green Dragon (A zöld sárkány gyermekei) is already in post-production and is planned to be released this autumn or at the next Hungarian Film Week the latest.

Legendary Hungarian soccer player, Ferenc Puskás will be the protagonist of an ambitious feature project which is planned to be finished in 2012.

Due to the political changes and budgetary revisions the new government has blocked a substantial amount of the Hungarian Motian Picture Association’s budget.

„I would call at least irresponsible the management in the previous years of the Hungarian Motion Picture Association” – the new president of MMKA, Zoltán Kőrösi told Index.hu after having finished the audit of the institution. MMKA has banking obligations in the value of 8 billion HUF (28.8 million Euros) which – according to Kőrösi – makes the financing of future projects almost impossible.

An African football player in a small Hungarian town, who commits a crime and has to flee is the main character of the new film of Hungarian director Szabolcs Hajdu.

A woman in her fifties, left by her husband is in the center of Ferenc Török’s new film which starts shooting this July and is planned to be completed by the end of the year. The shooting will start on 12th of July in Istanbul where the crew will work for 13 days. Afterwards on 2nd of August a 17 day shooting will start in Budapest.

Hungarian director János Szász, beside of preparing his new film Le grand cahier, based on an Agota Kristof novel, has been found by another, English speaking  project – [origo] published recently. The script of the film with the working title Goodbye Komárom has been written by the American Amir Kovács, who has Hungarian origins. The film will tell the story of his parents, who have been chased from the Hungarian city of Komárom during and again after the second world war.

Distribution is the weakest point of the Hungarian film industry – says the new president of the Hungarian Motion Picture Foundation in his interview. Instead of 25-31 films per year only 15 will be financed by the state but – hopefully – under better conditions.

Academy Award winner director István Szabó is working on the adaptation of a Hungarian novel, written by Magda Szabó, which has been translated to 32 languages. The project has recently been included among the international co-productions which are funded by the two national German funds, German Federal Film Board (FFA) and German Federal Film Fund (DFFF).

Cannes Fipresci jury presented the Un Certain Regard Prize of the International Critics to the Hungarian film Adrienn Pál directed by Ágnes Kocsis.

ADRIENN PÁL, Ágnes Kocsis's second feature film will be presented as part of the Un Certain Regard programme at the 2010 Festival de Cannes.

Accomplished short film and commercial director Károly Ujj-Mészáros' first feauture film, Liza the Fox-Fairy now in pre-production. has been invited to Cannes.

MFI and Scriptbase are offering a full scholarship to the Script 2 Film Workshop, held on the Aegean islands of Nissyros and Samos.

Tamás Almási has received Kossuth Prize for his outstanding documentary and feature films, presented on March 15 by László Sólyom, the President of Hungary.Almási directed his feature, Mario, the Magician and several important documentaries, including Puskás, Hungary about the famous Hungarian football player Ferenc Puskás.

The 12th edition of Cartoon Movie, one of the most important events for the European animation industry, took place in Lyon in March 2010. Cartoon is a co-production forum for the animation industry where producers have the opportunity to present their current projects or find partners, investors and distributors.

Gábor Csurdi, production manager for Budapest Film talks about the relationship of Hungarian cinema goers to animation, the potentials of 3D filmmaking, the distribution strategy of BUFI and the soon-to-be-released sci-fi animation movie 9 in Lyon.  

Hungarian director, Bálint Kenyeres, European Film Award (www.europeanfilmacademy.org) short film winner, has finished the script for his feature debut Yesterday based on Agota Kristof's novel, and the project is now in preproduction.