Mephisto's birthday
On February 11, 1981, Istvan Szabo's film "Mephisto" was released in cinemas in Hungary.
The film’s literary basis was the novel "Mephisto" written in 1936 by Klaus Mann, the son of classic of German literature Thomas Mann. The prototype of the protagonist of the novel is considered a relative of Klaus Mann, the German actor Gustaf Grundgens. Those who watched the Fritz Lang's movie "M" could see this actor.
At the same time, the ideological connection between Klaus Mann’s novel and Goethe’s immortal creation, Faust, is quite obvious. It is curious that if in the novel by Klaus Mann, and then in the film of Istvan Szabo, the prototype of Gustaf Grundgens represents Dr. Faust, then in his last film “Faust” in which Gustaf Grundgens plays Mephistopheles. Apparently, something diabolical was inherent in this actor, which is why he was drawn into the Nazi movement and exalted by it.
The film never mentions Hitler's name or shows his image. Likewise, the character of actor Rolf Hoppe, although he clearly portrays Hermann Göring, is never referred to by name, only his title of "Marshal". Goering was a Reichsmarschall. This title was specially created for him, since he was the second person of the Third Reich after Hitler. The traditional Nazi salute with a raised hand is not in the film either.
Another interesting point: the Hungarian film company Mafilm was helped in creating the film by two West German film companies: Manfred Durniok Filmproduktion and Hessischer Rundfunk. And this despite the fact that until 2000, Klaus Mann’s novel was banned in Germany. Russian film critic Yevgeny Nefyodov suggests that such a long ban on a book denouncing Nazism is explained not only by the respectful attitude of the German authorities to the request of Gustaf Grundgens' son, but also by the fact that
“the events of the work remained unacceptably topical at that moment ... when the authorities began a broad campaign to, let's say, stop repentant tendencies in the country responsible for unleashing the World War II and other Nazi atrocities."
Three months after the premiere in Hungary, Istvan Szabo's film took part in the Cannes International Film Festival, where it was nominated for the highest award - Palme d'Or. The jury of the film festival, chaired by the French filmmaker Jacques Deray, gave preference to the film by the Polish director Andrzej Wajda "Czlowiek z zelaza (Man of Iron)".
However, in the competition for the Academy Award in the Best Foreign Language Film category in 1982, these films switched places: "Mephisto" received an Oscar, and "Man of Iron" was content with a nomination. And in the same 1982, Istvan Szabo's film received another prestigious prize - the Italian award David di Donatello as Best Foreign Film.
The perception of the film by Istvan Szabo, who represented socialist Hungary, was, to put it mildly, ambiguous by American film critics. The reviewer of The New York Times, the mouthpiece of the US Democratic Party, Janet Maslin, apparently offended by the film "Mephisto" and its author for exposing Nazism, even before the film was presented to the participants of the New York Film Festival, erupted in a review filled with very unflattering characteristics about the film, of type:
"movie lacks an essential clarity", or "Mr. Szabo, who has set a number of characters and subplots in spin, has trouble keeping the material organized, and a number of later developments are unduly ambiguous", or "Mephisto" seems somewhat remote, without all the urgency of which Mr. Szabo has shown himself capable." By Janet Maslin Sept. 29, 1981
But the guru of American film criticism, Roger Ebert, devoted two whole reviews to Istvan Szabo's film "Mephisto". In both, he rated the film four stars out of a possible 4 and included it in his list of "Great Movies". In his first review, dated 1982, he wrote:
"Mephisto" does an uncanny job of creating its period, of showing us Hamburg and Berlin from the 1920s to the 1940s. I've never seen a movie that does a better job of showing the seductive Nazi practice of providing party members with theatrical costumes, titles and pageantry. In this movie not being a Nazi is like being at a black-tie ball in a brown corduroy suit. "
The audience rated the film "Mephisto" quite highly. 65% of IMDB and Kinopoisk users gave the film a score of 8 to 10. Based on this and the above success rates, Istvan Szabo's film "Mephisto" was rated 9,135 by FilmGourmand, making it 135th in the Golden Thousand. In addition to the film "Mephisto", the Golden Thousand included 6 more films. Rating "Mephisto" was the highest of these films. On this basis, we can conclude that "Mephisto" is the best film of Hungarian cinema.
