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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
szerelem, June 24, 2007
This review is from: Adoption (DVD)
"Adoption (Orokbefogachas)" directed by Marta Meszaros released in 1975 is a classic of Hungarian cinema. Lacking the political edge of Miklos Jansco's films and the Hungarian history of Istvan Szabo's early films, "Adoption" is an easily accessible film to non-Hungarians.
Kata (Katalin Berek) has been having an affair with Joska (Laszlo Szabo), who is married with children. Kata says she doesn't mind, in fact the two have decided Joska should not get a divorce but, at age 43 Kata decides she wants to have a baby. She knows what Joska's answer will be to her plea to having his baby, but she asks anyway. He of course says no. She is too old to have a child and he doesn't need the added responsibilty. Still Kata is lonely and wants a child.
Kata meets Anna (Gyongyver Vigh) an orphan who has been in instititues since the age of six. The two form a friendship as Anna is looking for a place she and her boyfriend Sandor can meet since they do not have money to buy or rent a place. Kata agrees, she wants the company.
The two form a friendship which seems to resemble a mother-daughter relationship. Perhaps Kata sees herself in the young girl. Maybe she is the daughter she never had. For a film called "Adoption" the movie is actually not about the adoption itself. It doesn't follow Kata going through the adoption process. The movie is really about love. A woman's basic urge to nuture and be a mother.
As Kata and Anna's friendship grows Kata discovers Anna would like to marry her boyfriend. So Kata tries to get Anna's parents to consent to the marriage. But, for someone as unstable as Anna, can she truly love? Would marriage be right for someone like her?
There was another Hungarian film made a few years before this one called "Szerelem", which translated into English means love. It was directed by Karoly Makk. There are some comparisons between the films. Both films deal with women relationships. In "Szerelem" it was about a mother and daughter-in-law. Both films are about age. Kata is old enough to be Anna's mother. And finally both films are simply about love. "Szerelem" has elements politics in it. It deals with life in Communist Hungary. "Adoption" doesn't get bogged down in Hungarian politics.
The director, Marta Meszaros may not be as well known as Jansco or Szabo or even Bela Tarr but her films are first rate. She was something of a femminist director. Her movies always revolve around women and women problems, i.e. motherhood, men, dating. But, as a man, I can tell you, these films are not what you would described as "chick flicks". These are engaging human films beautifully acted and wonderfully directed. Meszaros knows how to pace her films. "Adoption" for instance is only 82 minutes. Relatively short but it packs a dramatic wallop. Any more and the film would over stay its welcome and become repetitive.
When released in 1975 "Adoption" won the top prize at the Berlin International Film Festival. Many of Meszaros' films were critical hits. If your interested in Hungarian films or if you are about to watch your first Hungarian film "Adoption" is well worth seeing. Especially if you know little about Hungary's history.
Bottom-line: One of the all time great films of Hungarian cinema. Marta Meszaros' film is accessible to all people. It is a story about love and a women's urge to motherhood.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Exploring the Need to Love and Be Loved ..., April 8, 2010
This review is from: Adoption (DVD)
This film explores the core relationship of the need to love and be loved. Kata is a 43 year old widow who is having a relationship with a married man named Jòska. Kata confronts him with her desire: she wants to have his baby. Jòska is aghast at the thought and admits the idea scares him. He is against her having his child for a lot of reasons. They have managed to keep their affair secret and it seems he is afraid of being found out. Kata had in the past agreed to their arrangement: he wants to remain married, does not want to divorce his wife nor does he want a scandal which involves his two children, a son who is 15 years of age and a daughter who is 11. Her honest revelation has shaken them both up and created tension in their secret illicit relationship. Kata remains restless and unfulfilled with her life.
During this time, Kata develops a friendship with Anna, a teenaged girl with a troubled past who lives at a state run shelter for delinquents and orphans. Kata experiences empathy and fondness for Anna as she reveals the reasons she misbehaved which includes unloving parents who contributed to her despair that led to her acting out. Anna has had a physical relationship with a young man in the village where they live for about a year. The couple want to marry but she is underage and can not get her parents consent. Márta Mészáros provides a deeply sensitive and revealing film in black and white which explores the emotional dilemmas felt by all the characters who are portrayed with stark reality and an honesty seldom found in films. It is no surprise this film won the "Golden Bear" award at the Berlin Film Festival in 1975. Needless to say, the film quietly provides satifactory resolutions to the personal dilemmas with which each character was grappling ... Open dialogue, unexpected realistic acting, deep explorations of complicated emotions make this film an outstanding viewing experience. Erika Borsos [pepper flower]
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0 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Is the adoption process really this dull?, November 6, 2007
This review is from: Adoption (DVD)
A difficult film to review, "Adoption" is a human story about two females, their lives connecting together, and how a new friendship allows for deeper opportunities. This may sound like your typical buddy American comedy or dramedy, but this Hungarian feature is far from that mold. Director Marta Meszaros brings us into the world of Kata, a hard working woman who wants nothing more than to have a child of her own. In a random meeting with her estranged lover, she demands that they build a new branch of their relationship. Her secret lover, afraid to confuse his married life further, says "no", and pushes Kata into a new world - one in which she struggles daily to find a sense of comfort and solace in another human. Ironically, she lives very close to an all women's correctional facility, and some of the adventurous girls make their way to Kata's house to talk, impose, and meet with non-administered lovers. Kata sees some of these visits as a bond, and she instantly takes one girl under her wing as if she was her own. For another hour, Meszaros decorates the screen with long-winded shots, brief encounters, and an unsympathetic ending that does not engulf the preceding film. "Adoption" does not quite fit into the human drama element, but it does fit into the cinematic bizarre with staged acting, annoying music, and a camera that will not give us hope. "Adoption" is the quintessential art house foreign film, which begins with promise, but fails to fully develop any "glue" to keep us stuck to this story through to the end.
From the opening scene, through the course of the first thirty-minutes, I must admit I was captivated by what Meszaros was showing me. Her work initially seemed, and felt, like early Lars von Trier or Ang Lee. A poverty working woman desires more out of life, and while she cannot find it with her lover, a young - uncommitted - girl takes her further down the path than imaginable. At first, it was compelling. The drama between the characters was dedicated. Kata was sad, dull, and painfully hopeful as she tried to explain why she wanted the child (going through the entire physical process), but when random girls begin just showing up at her house one day - the film began to turn into something completely different. It became a more obscure film, using bits of Fellini and Goddard to be the inspiration - which can work, but when it is a dramatic change mid-film, it can frighten the more casual viewer. Even for me, this was difficult to watch because Kata transforms almost instantly before our eyes. She goes from sympathetic, to unsympathetic, back to sympathetic without any reason or cause. One of "Adoptions" major flaws is that Meszaros, while she has a great story in front of her, cannot seem to develop her central characters at all. Kata's motion, her reasons, her next steps are difficult to judge because we know very little about her. Her past, her likes, dislikes, her passions seem to be mixed in with her sense of hospitality. Films like "Adoption" suffer because it feels as if the audience has jumped into the middle of a story, instead of seeing it from the beginning.
As mentioned, the characters change from the beginning impressions until the end, giving us a reason to distrust them. The young girl Kata takes in is also random. Their moments together were wooden and plastic combined. If the cue cards were not sitting in front of them, would they have remembered their lines? The symbolism jumps from the screen, not in a good way, but one where studies can easily be done on the relationship between the two (i.e. is the mother reliving her youth - trying to pursue a life she never had, is the troubled teen looking for a mom, are the two a better fit than Kata with a child?) These are all very valid questions, but they do not create a better film. Eliminate the long shots of characters just staring at each other, eliminate the shots of Kata at work, eliminate the painfully troublesome wedding (which went on for way too long), and you do not have a substantial enough film for one to enjoy. The point, "Adoption" carries no meat with the nearly broken bones Meszaros has set. The characters are not substance enough to live on, so we search elsewhere - the scenery is bland - go elsewhere. How about the music? While traditional, it wasn't powerful enough to continue the mood. The forced realism of the performances gave this film a cardboard feel with no integrity.
"Adoption" was supposed to be a human drama about a woman wanting to adopt a child. Somewhere along the 89 minutes, Meszaros dropped that idea and went with our main character developing a relationship with a random person. Without giving away the ending, the final frames make us feel that we have been duped, and the past thirty-minutes were nothing of value. The final scene of this film was laughable. Finally, we were getting to the point, but it was too late - the film had already failed. While it was an award winner during its release in 1975, this slow-paced foreign film cannot stand on its two legs. The value over the years has dropped, giving us a very weak story with obvious character flaws. I watched it until the end anticipating a twist, or shock moment that would either get me excited about the focus of the director or makes me want to tell friends and family about this great feature. Alas, none of this happened. "Adoption" made me fall asleep twice due to the lack of consistency, dull characters, and extremely slow pacing. This is a film that could have been considered a short film when the frills were removed.
Overall, for this little film critic nothing worked. The characters started off with quick enjoyment, but just like every horse I bet on at the track, they lost speed and nearly didn't finish the race. We knew nothing about these guides, the ones that were to lead us through Hungary's adoption issues. Kata was a worker, the other a student - that is it. Not enough for a feature film. I cannot suggest this film, and while I had high hopes for what "Adoption" would accomplish, the final result felt like a first year project, not an award winning piece. If this was going to be a film about adoptions or about Kata's desire for a family, than it should have focused fully on that - the final product, albeit brings questions from the academic side, doesn't equate to good cinema on the critics side. Pass on this one, there are better stories about adoption and family pride - take "Tokyo Godfathers" - there is a foreign film that wasn't afraid to take its characters to the next level. "Adoption" was a high disappointment on the cinematic Hungarian front.
Grade: * ˝ out of *****
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