Explanation for Everything

Abel is a typical teenager. Driven by his emotions, he’s more interested in a female classmate than he is in his studies. When he takes an oral exam at school, he’s speechless. To get him to talk, Abel’s history teacher, Jakub, asks him about the obliquely political pin he wears on his blazer, but Abel remains uncommunicative and fails the class. When faced with his conservative nationalist father György’s wrath, and knowing that Jakub has previously clashed with György over politics, Abel uses the query as an excuse for his grade: an unpatriotic act of prejudice from his liberal-leaning teacher. Things soon escalate. A careerist journalist makes the story a national issue and the truth is lost in a barrage of prejudice and ignorance.

Told from a variety of perspectives that gives depth and lucidity to the issues raised in the film, Gábor Reisz's powerful drama is a damning indictment of reactionary politics and bad-faith journalism. Reisz and Éva Schulze’s script steers clear of demonising any character, while the humour present in the writer-director’s previous films, For Some Inexplicable Reason (2014) and Bad Poems (2018), remains a potent force in this ever relevant drama.

– Ian Haydn Smith