Known for Acting
Emese, a wealthy old lady returning from Switzerland, invites her seven surviving classmates, all graduates of the 1930s, to a belated 50th reunion at her own expense. All but one of them live abroad, and they gather at the hotel on Margaret Island from all over Europe, where the hour of honesty arrives for all. During their days together, they confront themselves and their sins of the past decades. This is Hédi Váradi's last work for television, and her classmates Hilda Gobbi, Zsuzsa Gordon, Teri Náray, Juci Komlós, Erzsi Pártos and Zsuzsa Bánki all give excellent and long-lasting character performances.
It is a tragedy, set among low-lifes on the outskirts of Budapest. Dramatic Exchange describes it as "Widely considered to be the most important Hungarian play of the last 20 years". The odd title of the play refers in the first instance to the chicken heads that an old woman feeds to her cat. However, it can also be taken to refer more broadly to the obtuse behaviour of the main characters in the play. The play is an odd mixture of pathos and nihilism, written against the bleak background of Stalinist totalitarianism from which Hungary was emerging. As with much modern drama, there is no hero in the play. The only noble behaviour that one can find belongs to one of the characters in the past, when he was a child, but he is no longer as he was. The hint that what once existed might be achieved again is the only faint ray of hope in a very bleak view of the human condition.
Szaffi is a full-length animated feature based on Mór Jókai’s short books The Gypsy Baron (A cigánybáró) and Szaffi. It has adventure, and treasure, and love, and a little black cat, and a war, and picturesque villains - a governor with a pressure release valve in his skull and a fat pig-loving baron, and of course, the good gypsies.
Tina, Julie and Alfa simply turn the tables on love: they don't wait for the guys to come on, they throw themselves into the action when they meet the bowling clique around Tim, Freddy and Rolf. Although their goal is actually only the bowling competition in St. Tropez, they let the party go on. And then it turns out that Tina's father has a plane that might take the boys to St. Tropez...
Tommy and Mike, again without a job and without money, are looking for a public toilet at a motor show.
The German national swimming team travels to Budapest for a competition. However, the teenagers are more interested in flirting with each other than training. Their coach is less than thrilled with his team's behavior.
The elite of political and business life of the country town gather to celebrate the namesday of László in the luxury villa. Everything begins just as usual, but now an incident disturbs the stag party.
During World War II Carlotta, the circus owner maintains herself, her lover and her rather run-down circus-team by illegal man-smuggling. In the year of 1944, besides the usual refugees, she even has to take Professor Máté, the renown mathematician to the Yugoslavian partisans. The team is joined by Carlotta's psychotic son who has escaped from an asylum.
Lt. Kojak arrives in Budapest as a guest speaker for the 'International Crime Writers Conference'. Soon after he starts enjoying the pleasures that the city has to offer, he assists his old friends at the police department with a case. The case involves solving the murder of a noted scientist, unaware that a Mafia hit man and his female companion are targeting him.
