Oszthatatlan ember – szinopszis
Of Single Mind
Production: GRANTFILM LTD, Hungary
Producer: Dr. Endre Nagy
Writer: Tibor Fonyódi
Cast: international cast
Genre: feature, drama
Length: 95 minute
Format: 35 mm
Language: English
Shooting: 2006 in Hungary
Do we know Béla Bartók? Do we know this artist of significance in the history of universal culture who worked amidst the tragic events of the twentieth century and created something of eternal value?
In the screenplay we show Bartók’s last days in Budapest and his life in New York, making use of documentary sources for the sake of authenticity. Yet our story is not a biography, but the presentation of the Calvary of a colossal personality expressed through the figure of the Maestro. The frame for this structure is provided by a childhood friendship, a relationship which in an ambivalent way follows the course of the Maestro’s emigration.
Following a long and painful period of deliberation, Bartók decides to emigrate, pondering with uncertainty and profound pain on the possibility of returning. However, deep within himself he knows that it is hopeless… his homeland was destined to be dominated by dictatorships, German and then Russian.
[*]The Maestro does not wish to be estranged from Hungary but from his moral conviction and belief he feels, knows and decides that returning is impossible.
It is not his life’s story but fate that we wish to show.
We wish to present a story of human dignity, moral standing and strength as an example for the people of the new millennium.
In the description and later in the film sentences are often uttered by the character of the Maestro that can be accurately traced to written records or sound recordings in Bartók’s legacy. (!)
We wish to convey the “moment” or “series of moments” which makes Bartók’s internal and external emigration, i.e. his unwillingness to collaborate with any dictatorial power, clear to today’s audience.
“Since Béla Bartók emerged, the romantic approach to artists and romantic biography of artists has been eclipsed. Whoever trod the path to hell and heaven with him, whoever lived through all the tribulations of the age with him and learnt from him to believe in the future would take little pleasure in artificially embellished literary imitations of true dramas from life. The powers forming our lives have made it clear that nothing can be more exciting than truth, the world of facts. ”
This is not a biographical film but a story inspired by real life.
Drawing “only from a pure source”, to quote Bartók himself, we should like to show the staggering power and universal truth of Bartók’s life’s work through the figure of the Maestro.
The way he wended, both personally and creatively, was a moral and intellectual Odyssey of modern times, the destiny of eternal man who despite the horrors of destruction wishes to preserve the human-divine values invested in him.
Our story tells of the passion burning in a withdrawn personality.
[*]“Making a portrait of Béla Bartók would be impossible without the inner need to go in quest of and to express the unstylized truth. He himself showed us a real example through his life and his life’s work, a real manifestation of truth and passionately strict objectivity, both universally and at each of its moments.”
Béla Balázs gave his article on Bartók the title Man of Single Mind.
We shall recount the last moments of this man of single mind, this revolutionary artist and academic with a diamond-hard nature.
Myths, half information and political bans have prevented us from getting to know his real fate and character until now.
Yet I am convinced that we ought to know who this man is, the man who could show in his life’s work the universality of culture, and its interdependent, organic continuity.
Through reconstructed scenes and available archive materials, in concert with a focus on the human face, we wish to show the audience the minute oscillations, the most harrowing moments and a few important and genuine episodes expressing the pain of decision.
Silences and the gestures of metacommunication create an extremely strong dramatic fabric through inner cuts and suggestive looks and faces. This can create a mental and emotional catharsis.
This may be the key to the film attracting a large audience.
The planned film is about a man – an authentic Hungarian artist of genuine, universal value even today, called Béla Bartók.