ALEX FARBA

Sándor Deleon, Budapest

Hungarian director Laszlo Nemes with Oscar on Magyar TV

The big news on Magyar TV all day long on Monday, February 29 -- leap year day -- was Endless repetitions every hour of young Hungarian director, Laszlo Nemes Jeles, accepting his Oscar in Hollywood for the Best Foreign Language film of the year. The other Oscar prizes were barely alluded to.   Another Oscar for Hungary has been a long time coming. The one and only previous Hungarian Oscar was for Istvan's Szabo's MEPHISTO back in 1981 when Nemes was merely four years old.

The son of a Hungarian film director, András Jeles,  Laszlo Nemes Jeles has worked as assistant to Bela Tarr on two films and made three prize winning shorts before submitting a three page treatment for his first feature to Andy Vajna, head of the recently created Hungarian film funding organization.

Vajna's support of the young director to the tune of one million Euros, a relatively modest investment for a feature film, was roundly vindicated when Nemes' offbeat low budget Concentration camp drama, a harrowing depiction of one day in the life of a concentration camp inmate who is forced to help dispose of bodies from gas chambers, went on to win the Palme d'or at Cannes in 2015 and the Golden Globes in Los Angeles just a few weeks ago.

This was an example of getting a three-page idea from a director that became a world success and will be a great inspiration to our young filmmakers Vajna noted.

Andy Vajna  had a long successful career in Hollywood as a producer with such films as Rambo and Robocop to his credit before returning to his native Budapest five years ago to assume the role of government commissioner in charge of the newly created film funding system.

The fund put more than $1 million into Son of Saul after Nemes, a first-time feature director, submitted a brief treatment.

We looked at Nemes's prize winning short films," said Vajna but because this was his first feature length  film, we were sort of hesitant in our financing; we gave him 300 million forints, which is about one million Euros, and we supported him and helped him in the development. But when we saw the finished product, we were amazed -- everything was in place. The movie spoke for itself. I am very proud of Laszlo for being able to create something that went so far beyond the pages of the script. 

Hungary's film fund, which is supported by the proceeds of one of the country's national lotteries, offers fledgling filmmakers the chance to begin a career, he went on to say.

"I have worked in the U.S. for a long time and I know how difficult it is 

to put together a movie, especially a first film".

This system in Hungary makes things easier and allows you  to prove yourself. If you have an idea and a vision and are willing to work hard for it, then it is possible to succeed."

On Monday the daily newspaper Nepszabadsag declared that the success of Son of Saul  meant that the film had "irrevocably entered into film history," starting with  winning a grand jury prize in Cannes last year then the Golden Globes honor and finally an Oscar.    Online news portal Hungary Today noted that the film's   "sensational" success also includes Saturday's prize for best international film at the Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica. Quite a sweep for a low budget feature film debut.

The Foreign Language film award may have been little more than a footnote in the gala proceedings at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood on Sunday Night dominated by Leonardo DiCaprio,  Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu and all the usual Tinseltown celebrities, but here in Hungary it is being treated something like a major military victory where even Prime Minister Viktor Orbán chimed in with praise from the summit.