6:3

To put an end to any confusion about the title: 6-3 is for many Hungarians the same as 2-1 for the Dutch. In 1953 the famous Hungarian eleven beat the English with that score, such as the Dutch beat the Germans 2-1 in 1988. Just as the ref whistles for the kick off, a child is born. His mother seems less happy about the event because she gives up the baby straight away. The boy, at first called 6-3 and later Tutti (‘Sure Thing’), never seems to recover. When he grows up, he is a civil servant – street- sweeper, to be exact – and soccer fanatic, completely obsessed by the famous duel. One day he finds an old football in the street. He kicks the thing and then something strange happens. When a woman asks him to clear up some stuff belonging to her late father, Tutti finds the shirt worn by Hidegkuti, one of the stars of the ’53 team. He puts on the shirt, faints and… wakes up in the fifties. 6:3 is a light comedy that evokes the Stalinist years in Hungary in a beautifully absurd way. The unconventional approach makes the film offer an unexpected reflection on Hungarian history. The euphoria of the soccer successes from the early fifties were smothered in 1956 by the bloody suppression of the Hungarian rebellion by Russian troops.