Focus: Judit Elek
Programme IFFR 2023
Judit Elek (1937) is among world cinema’s most uncompromising figures. Beloved by IFFR founder Huub Bals, yet to this day little known in wider circles, Elek made both fiction and documentary films that are almost brutally personal, reflecting as much the history of her native Hungary as her own trauma-riddled life. International Film Festival Rotterdam is honoured to present the most complete retrospective so far of an auteur whose works and wisdom are needed today as urgently as ever.
Overview of films
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Book launch: Judit Elek
Judit Elek discusses her her films with three writers/editors of a new book on her work. -
Direct Television
This glimpse into Judit Elek’s television work offers some perfect examples for how to turn commissions into deeply personal works. -
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After All the Dead Sing Again…
Judit Elek | 72' | Hungary | None
Concert documentary about a performance of Chasidic songs by composer Max/Miksa/Mihai Eisikovits. -
Awakening
Judit Elek | 110' | France | None
Film à clef of Judit Elek’s teenage years in 1950s Budapest, between Stalinist rule and first longings. -
A Commonplace Story
Judit Elek | 104' | Hungary | None
Part two of Judit Elek’s Istenmezején documentary, where relationships with locals get both tighter and more ambivalent. -
The Eighth Day of the Week
Judit Elek | 100' | Hungary | None
A former operetta diva is evicted in a tragicomedy about life never changing too much. -
Encounter
Judit Elek | 23' | Hungary | None
A man, a woman, an afternoon, a city and an unspoken hope of finding love. -
A Free Man – The Life of Ernő Fisch
Judit Elek | 107' | France | None
A portrait of Ernő Fisch, who managed to flee persecution and survive the Holocaust. -
How Long Does Man Live?
Judit Elek | 60' | Hungary | None
What is a human being worth in a society that measures value by productivity? -
Inhabitants of Castles in Hungary in 1966
Judit Elek | 27' | Hungary | None
A look at the present use of several Hungarian castles and some of their former owners. -
The Lady from Constantinople
Judit Elek | 76' | Hungary | None
Scenes from the life of a lonely elderly lady in utterly bizarre situations. A masterpiece hopscotching between surrealism and cinema vérit&eac
