Product Details

• Actors: Sándor Csányi, Eszter Balla, Zoltán Mucsi, Csaba Pindroch, Sándor Badár
• Directors: Nimród Antal
• Writers: Nimród Antal, Jim Adler
• Producers: Tamás Hutlassa
• Format: Color, DVD, Subtitled, NTSC
• Language: Hungarian
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Studio: Velocity / Thinkfilm
• DVD Release Date: August 30, 2005
• Run Time: 105 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0009UZGDW
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #21,879 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)

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  #1 in	Movies & TV > Art House & International > By Original Language > Hungarian
  #7 in	Movies & TV > Art House & International > European Cinema > Hungary

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
The setting of Kontroll is the Budapest subway system, one of the largest and oldest in the world, and a place that becomes an omniscient character in an ambitious film that jumbles dark comedy, slick action, and horror-movie conventions. The other main character is Bulcsú (Sándor Csányi), part of a team of disheveled ticket inspectors--controllers--who roam the grimy, fluorescent-lit city-under-the-city in a soul-destroying ritual. The job has become such a part of Bulcsú that he never leaves the underground. He has taken to sleeping on empty platforms and getting progressively more unkempt as he accumulates more bruises, bloody noses, and bitterness from his scraps with a variety of unseemly creatures of the night (and day). Among the post-punk, post-communist habitués of this subterranean metropolis are a cute girl in a teddy-bear suit, a rival gang of ticket inspectors who like to play a deadly game of chicken with express trains, and a hooded specter who may or may not be pushing people under subway wheels at crowded stops. First-time director Nimród Antal keenly juggles black comedy, character types, and genre styles, making the most of the weird angles and inherent dark creepiness of his chosen backdrop. Kontroll keeps pace as a hip, flashy, fast-moving set piece by any international measure. --Ted Fry

Product Description
The Budapest subway system, the world’s oldest, is a dark labyrinthine netherworld as vast and various as the city above. Hordes of people pass through on their way to better, brighter places. There are some who spend most of their lives underground- the ticket inspectors or "Controllers" who are assigned in teams to sections of the system and whose thankless job is to ensure that no passengers ride without paying… Deployed by those in control- they are a much-despised lot…who on his way wants to be stopped and asked for a receipt by petty officers that represent power at its most powerless.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Underground, May 4, 2005

By	MICHAEL ACUNA (Southern California United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Bulscu (Sándor Csányi) works in the Budapest Metro as a ticket checker, an enforcer: he makes sure that people have a ticket to ride the subway and cites them when they don't. From what is on view in Nimrod Antal's provocative and eerie "Kontroll" it seems like most people don't pay and Bulscu and his group get involved in a lot of fist fights and chases in trying to uphold the rules of the underground. As his sorta-girfriend says: "Everyone hates you."
"Kontroll" is interesting on several fronts. First of all, it is a Hungarian film directed by an American originally from Hungary...and when was the last time you saw a Hungarian film? Secondly, it is masterfully directed, photographed and staged in the bowels of the Budapest underground metro, which naturally gives the film credence and atmosphere that would not have been possible to reconstruct in any studio set. Thirdly, along with Csanyi's evocative performance as the troubled and conflicted Bulscu, we are introduced to many fine Hungarian actors and actresses who help to make this film the success that it is.
Csanyi has the uncanny ability to be strong and intelligent (it is strongly hinted that he was an architect before joining the "underworld") yet he is very much afraid of the world that the escalators up to street level represent. He is of the world but hiding from it and we are not sure why... and this ambiguity strengthens rather than weakens his basic nature because it humanizes him.
"Kontroll" is one of those rare films that not only succeeds on its own artistic terms but also stands as an anthropological document of a country that is undergoing rapid, unencumbered social and political change.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Death's Subway Ride, December 3, 2005

By	Daly Mavorneen "Brimstone" (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

Part humorous gross out film (lots of pissing, vomiting, bleeding, spitting and tooth-picking), part Alice in Wonderland homage (complete with a giant fuzzy bear leading the protagonist down into the subway caves) and part psych 101 character study, Kontroll does not succeed on all these levels, but it sure is a fun ride.

SImply put, it's about one person escaping their self-imposed personal hell by beating death (literally) before death gets him. Throw in a some terrific acting, an arresting score of songs and brilliant film composition, and you have "Angel Heart" meets "The Taking of Pelham 123."

For the people on Netflix & Amazon who want to know the theme song's identity (because there are no music credits & no score CD), it's the lead singer of UK group, Moloko, Roisin Muphy's "Sinking Feelikng" from her brilliant 2005 solo CD, "Ruby Blue."

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Amazing Film, Subpar DVD (a better DVD release would have rated 5 stars, absolutely), August 3, 2007

By	Timmy K. "Zoidberg Enthusiast" (123 Fake Street, Springfield AX) - See all my reviews

Many people have already written about what this film is about so I will not say any more on that. I will state simply that this is a wonderful film, one of my favorites from 2005 (the year it played in my local theater), and it is exciting, thought provoking, and often very funny. I went into it originally knowing almost nothing about it and was delighted at what I saw. So much so that I went to see it a second time later in the week before it was gone.

All of that said I was thrilled to get it on DVD. But my thrill turned to slight disappointment when I realized that not only was it a barebones DVD as far as extras go (there are absolutely no extras at all), and not only were the subtitles burned into the image (i.e. non-removable), but it was also a non-anamorphic transfer. In fact the only saving grace for this disc (besides the exceptional film) is that the burned in subtitles are over the film image rather than the black letterboxing. This means that when played on a widescreen TV, and zoomed in to fill the entire screen (to compensate for it not being anamorphic) the subtitles are clearly readable and do not get cut off. But it is completely unforgivable for ANY DVD to be released in the year 2005 with a non-anamorphic widescreen transfer, and burned in subtitles. Unforgivable. And on top of that the film is not inexpensive by any means. Amazon sells it for $24.99 (at the time of this writing), and I purchased it in store for about $28. If it was any other film I would have returned it if at all possible, and been a lot more scathing in my review. But since I absolutely love this film I can only be disappointed that it received about the worst possible DVD release it could get. The only thing that could have made it worse would be if it was only available in a so called "fullscreen" version and not widescreen at all. But having averted that absolute catastrophe scenario they settled on the next worst DVD release they could manage. I'm considering tracking down a much better foreign version I've heard about.

(UPDATE EDIT) Since writing me review I have noticed that the price of this DVD has significantly dropped. As of now (December 2008) it is only $7.99 on Amazon. Taking this into account I can more highly recommend the DVD even given the overwhelming lack of quality presentation I talk about in the review. Sure it is still a shame that this excellent film wasn't presented better on it's DVD, but not as big of a shame as it was when it originally cost $28. This movie, even given this shamefully lackluster DVD release, is well worth $7.99.