The Red and The White
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Manufacturer: Kino Video
Starring: József Madaras, Tibor Molnár, András Kozák, Jácint Juhász, Anatoli Yabbarov
Directed By: Miklós Jancsó
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: DVD
EAN: 0738329022327
Format: Black & White
Label: Kino Video
Manufacturer: Kino Video
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Kino Video
Region Code: 1
Release Date: 2002-01-08
Running Time: 90
Studio: Kino Video
Theatrical Release Date: 1968-09-20
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Editorial Reviews:
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Miklós Janscó takes the romance out of Russia's Revolutionary struggle in this simultaneously beautiful and brutal look at the civil war following the Bolshevik coup of 1918. Set in a remote region of Central Russia in 1919, The Red and the White follows the shifting balance of power around an abandoned monastery. The anti-Bolshevik White Army has embarked on a campaign to completely eradicate the area of Red Army soldiers, and scores of Hungarians, former Bolshevik prisoners thrust into battle, are caught in the middle. The graceful camerawork and lush, lovely landscape captured in stunning black-and-white widescreen stand in sharp contrast to the abrupt on-the-spot executions and sadistic cat-and-mouse games of the White Army, hiding behind a mask of politeness and civility as they line up their next row of victims. But Janscó's portrayal of the Bolsheviks, while decidedly more heroic, isn't much more sympathetic. The dreamlike poetry of Janscó's cinema and the surreal atmosphere of doom carries the film in place of a strong story or a central set of characters, but there is no mistaking his sympathies for the victims of the struggle--peasants and prisoners and civilians caught between collision of two armies, systematically stripped of their dignity and their lives as the battle rages around them like an evocation of hell on Earth. It's a brave stance for a Hungarian filmmaker working on Soviet soil in 1968 and it makes for a powerful film. --Sean Axmaker
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: stunning in its understated brutality
Comment: Miklos Jancso is unlike any other director ever. Complex movements of the camera and people and things. Random brutality usually not shown graphically overshadows the causes. Seemingly principal characters usually don't last long. Memorable scenes include a birch forest with people flickering in and out of existence and the final battle with its tiny figures falling like dolls. I sampled a few minutes just to make sure the dvd was good and ended up watching the whole thing at 2 am.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Back and forth. Back and forth.
Comment: Powerful and provoking elegant film about the futility of war, directed by formalist filmmaker Miklos Jancso. Not for everyone. There is no single narrative-instead, a series of long tracking shots that depict the endless ordering and re-ordering of groups of soldiers and women. Characters come and go--depicted in the odd emotion free acting style typical of director Jancso's ritual filled films.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: The Red and the White
Comment: In the 60s Jansco and Forman were 2 of the few windows to the east. I wanted to know what the peoples behind the curtain were like. Were they like us? Were they brainwashed by Communism? Most importantly, did the girls look like (the shot putter) Tamara Press or Zsa Zsa Gabor? Jansco showed us sweeping action across an ageless Volga landscape, centred on a 19th century monastery. The ideologies of Communism and anti Communism clearly meant little to a people who had another priority - real life. As armies advanced and retreated the characters just had to stand still to become heroes or villains. The abiding impression is of total stoicism in the face of random violence by outsiders - which I guess is the inner strength of the peoples living between the ravaged lands from the Baltic to the Bosforus.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The Most Important Hungarian Film Ever!
Comment: In a very famous episode of "Seinfeld" Jerry tells Elaine the original title for Tolstoy's "War and Peace" was "War. What is it good for"?
I don't know if there's any truth to that but that could have been the working title for Miklos Jancso's "The Red and the White".
As we watch this film don't be surprised if you have no clue what side the characters are on. Normally that would be a flaw in a film. If we don't understand who the characters are, we can't follow the story. But in this film's case, that's exactly the point. We aren't suppose to know who these characters are. Actually I don't think we ever come to know any of these characters names.
But what makes "The Red and the White" the most important Hungarian film ever made? Much has to do with the time it was made and the film's message.
I don't want to bore you here with a historical and political lecture on the history of Hungary but I suppose some background information is needed.
The film was made in 1967, 11 years after the Hungarian Revolution between the Hungarians and the Soviet Union. If that wasn't enough, the film was shot in the Soviet Union! Try to think about the significance of that. Here is a film that deals with Soviets, Communism and Hungarians! The blood was still fresh on the wall from what happened in '56!
Most people should know the plot behind the film. This is one of the better known Hungarian films and is fairly accessible. Still, I'll give a brief run-down of the plot.
The film takes place in 1919. We are in the middle of a war between the reds (the Bolsheviks') and the whites (Czarists) as the Hungarians have volunteered to aid the Bolsheviks.
As I mentioned earlier we never really know who is on what side. And ultimately that's the message behind the film. War is a senseless confusing act. In Woody Allen's film "Love and Death" Allen's character describes war as the following.."we kill a few Frenchmen, they kill a few Russians and before you know it, it's Easter." Something about war just doesn't seem logical and rational.
But how does Jancso get this point across? It's very interesting what he does with the camera. Pay close attention and you'll notice the camera is never giving us a particular character's POV (point of view).
The camera takes a non-bias stance. It remains on the outside of the action. It is merely an observer, like us. Because of this we can't readily identify with anyone. We never really get close enough to any character or situation long enough to firmly grasp what is really going on.
It must have been a pretty bold statement Miklos Jancso was making at the time. Especially when you put the film in its historical context. I wonder what the reaction was like in Hungary during the film's release. I know just within my own family it stirs strong emotions. I must have seen this film 10 or 15 times (but who's counting anyway). It's my father's favorite movie.
Jancso usually pushed the envelope in his films. They make very bold political statements. In some ways I can see "Hungarian Rhapsody" being played on the same bill as this movie. If you're interested try to make a double feature night for yourself.
Here is a film that is truly unforgettable, bold and powerful. It doesn't back down. For political and social reasons it is the most important Hungarian film ever made (realize though I'm not saying "the best"). And perhaps Miklos Jancso best.
Bottom-line: Powerful anti-war film that is the single most important Hungarian film ever made!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Clearly Portrays the Dehumanization and Senselessness of War
Comment: Being filmed in black and white, the drama is even more intense as the long shots of the camera hone the viewer's eye to a lovely landscape where the onion-domed spires of a monastery come into view. The first scenes begin in the yard of the Russian monastery. The camera captures different views of this most attractive building. It is a religious building, something which symbolizes peace, love, and human dignity ... a sharp contrast to what actually occurs within its walls. The building is headquarters for the Czarists (Whites). They captured a battalion of Red fighters who are separated by nationality. Two groups emerge, the Russian and international (mostly Hungarian). The Hungarian Communists had come to fight for the cause of their comrades, to bring about a new form of government. They are imprisoned within a small confined yard and march to orders. Eventually they stand up against a wall and are ordered to remove their shirts (which must be a valuable commodity, in short supply, as this happens often in the film). Several soldiers are selected out by the officers, to stand aside. The viewer wonders why are they removed, what will happen to them? The large group is herded out and one hears nuermous shots, they are obviously executed. A large group of Czarist officers arrive. One captive is told to run in the yard. A gun is given to the officer, who takes aim and keeps shooting until he kills the running prisoner. This scene is repeated several times ...
Other great scenes include the Red soldiers wading through the Volga or riding a boat down the river in attempts to escape the pursuing Czarist soldiers. Long views of magnificent scenery includes hills, and forests in the background which serve as the canvas backdrop on which the Czarist cavalry chase the Reds and engage them in battle in Central Russia. The film does not follow any one battalion or group of soldiers ... you get random shots and views of different events happening ... just as chaotic as it would be on a true battle front. Another major event occurs at a farmhouse where a young woman is carrying water from a well. The Czarist officers stop her, some elderly women come out to see what is happening. The young lady is forced to completely undress for the officer and the worst is expected to happen ... Suddenly, the Reds arrive and rescue her from this fate. They kill the Czarist officer ... a battle ensues between the two sides. The message seems, that innocent civilians are caught in the crossfire and made to pay a high price for the ideological and political battle between the opposing forces. Likely, farmers do not care much one way or the other who wins, they just want to eke a living out of the land, like their ancestors before them ...
One of the last scenes occurs in a lovely wooden structure which is a hospital where the nurses care for both the Reds and Whites as patients. They do not make political distinctions between the injured, they simply care for patients. Some Red soldiers have escaped detection and are hiding in the wood-pile and in the rushes and shrubbery along the Volga. The Czarist soldiers are shooting into the plants along the shore line. They do not find the Reds in the wood-pile. A nurse helps several Red soldiers to find safety within the hospital. One of the Reds corners her in a room and steals a kiss. She is obviously attracted, saying she would love to get naked for him. He knows his time there is limited as the Whites are searching for him. He escapes to the river, where a White soldier spears him dead with a long pole. The head nurse is asked to identify who is Red and who is White among their patients. She will not do it, claiming they are all the same to her. Another nurse is grabbed and given the same order. She is convinced she will die if she does not obey. She points out two Reds, who are executed on the spot. The Reds arrive to drive out the Czarists ... The Reds witnessed the preceding events and despite the head nurse's protests, they shoot the nurse and a White soldier holding them responsbile for the previous murders. This happens despite the protests of the head nurse who is told, "no one can be forced to submit". The Red soldiers are sent into the rye fields to ambush the Whites. In the last scene, a Hungarian soldier walks through the field of rye, viewing the dead bodies of compatriots. He holds his sword to his chest and nose in a good-bye salute, the last witness to a battle bravely fought but obviously lost ...
Essentially, the film is a testament to the human spirit which takes ideology to its fullest limits: to fight for a cause ... that in the end seems pointless and is lost among the human carnage that results from war. The film is an artistic and cinematic masterpiece in how it captures landscapes and beautiful scenery, idyllic and peaceful that is suddenly interrupted by soldiers on horseback armed with firearms and swords ... out to kill their enemy. The contrast is so vivid and contradictory. The viewer is given a ring-side seat to battles, executions and unpleasant events which have likely been sanitized for the viewing public. Having heard from eyewitnesses of real events and atrocities committed by the soldiers of the USSR in Central Europe during World War II, this film is most certainly a laundered version of true events. And even this cleaned up version was banned for many years in the USSR ... As they say, "The truth always hurts ...". This ia an excellent film about the absurdities and senselessness of war. Erika Borsos (pepper flower)
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