Gábor Gelencsér Trabi of Dreams

The happiest films of the happiest barrack

Gaál Béla: Car of Dreams (1934) 61 KByte	If we wanted to summarise the history of comedy in Hungary we could easily come to a slightly twisted conclusion: before the World War II Hungarian film art only had tradition in comedies - after the war it had everything but comedy. Comedy predominated the 30s and 40s and was underrepresented from the 50s - first it courted the favour of the audience then it completely ignored expectations of viewers. The critics reproach both extremes finding the film art of the earlier years too light and those of the later period too heavy. Nevertheless, the history of this genre does not only belong to the comedy itself. World War II opened a completely new period in the film art of Hungary. The history of comedy is a sensible tool of measuring the social changes: what are those changes consist of, what has remained the same, what should have been born out of the heavy ideological pressure on the genre. We can mention ideological pressure in both periods although from different point of views. In the first 15 years of talking picture filmmaking centred on the actors and was market-oriented. It gave the viewers a sharp picture of the „noble” Hungary even in „white-phone” settings, too. Yet, what filmmakers wanted to give was nothing else but one and a half-hour of sheer entertainment with no politics. Obviously, the period brought up masters of the genre: actors, directors, writers and songwriters. The story was based on a simple scheme; the source of comedy in most cases was pure accident or exchange of roles. It is also not too difficult to list the types that kept returning in different figures. The tools of comedy were used to enrich - and sometimes to make watchable - the melodramas that alone were very poor in content. If there was any „social” message woven into these melodramatic comedies it should be tracked in the comical types and situations. Car of Dreams (Meseautó, d: Béla Gaál, 1934) that represents the period perfectly is not more but no less either than the average - probably that was the secret of its success. The story is based on schemes like „the poor girl gets lucky” and „unselfish love”. Among the luring tools, we have beautiful landscapes, songs that can be sung along. In addition we also have a funny by-plot that helps the love-theme unfold: the ever-lasting quarrel between the old maid secretary who is hopelessly in love with the director and the all-time-clerk small timer who is hopelessly in love with her. As usually in this period Gyula Kabos plays the small timer (his partner is Ella Gombaszögi - the two of them played in many films together). His presence in the films of this period was not only a remarkable achievement in acting. His presence gave character to these worthless melodramas, a typical Hungarian character in the 30s and 40s. The interpreter of this all-time loser but always surviving character had to run away from fascism all the way to America in 1939. His career ended, he died two years later but became the most typical figure of that period. The part - that of course was not always played by him - brought on screen the thoughts, dreams and reactions of the people sitting in the auditorium. We can always burn for beautiful women and be exited for unreachable heroes but whom we like is the comedienne and the comedian. Because they are like us. What tells a lot about the film art of that period is that the situation of an average man - at least as a trend - could only be presented with more or less informality by the funny situations of the melodramas. Following World War II, more precisely after 1948 when nationalisation of film producing began in Hungary the state productions that ignored aspects of market were no longer driven by the initiative to entertain but to spread ideology. While the comedies of the 30s and 40s got across a social „message” without even knowing or wanted it, from the 50s the „message” was the film itself - sometimes openly other times hidden between the lines. However, to teach people good can be a heavy task to carry out especially when the crowd goes to the movies in order to have fun and not to be educated. Therefore, the comedy along with other genres loved by the public could not be thrown out of the ideological film producing. It only had to be reform and adjust to the expectations of the new period. From as early as 1948 up to 1989 the question of „socialist comedy” was always present in the Hungarian film politics. „Will the public turn away from us if we make no comedies - what would happen to the educating content of the most important art?” If we recall the discussions - and movies - of that time we might find ourselves in the middle of a comedy. The ruling power wants to put ideology in to something he condemns on ideological base. On other hand, what he could ideologically accept - grotesque and satire - he was afraid of. That is how „production comedies” during the most bitter dictatorship were born using the genre elements - and actors - of the 30s and 40s. That is how the grotesque and satire films under the soft dictatorship in the 60s were not born. Singing Makes Life Beautiful (Dalolva szép az élet d: Márton Keleti, 1950) is a perfectly funny mix of the principles of socialist-realist theory set by Zdanev and the tradition of comedy prior to the war. One can find everything already known, let's say, from Car of Dreams: love, misunderstanding, hit songs. There are the professionals who were brought up by the old school such as Kálmán Latabár who managed to bring over his art to socialism. The most memorable elements of the film are his magician tricks just as from Car of Dreams everyone recalls the scene of stamping. But the ideological outfit does not fit that very strong comedian tradition - neither does the melodramatic tradition that should have not been taken over at all. What we see is almost entertaining - but not the way the customers wanted it. And also revealing: it is not enough to rewrite the melodramatic and comedian types (clerks and directors to factory workers and party secretaries), the outcome does not automatically form into socialist comedy. It is more likely a comedy about socialist-realism. There were comedies that had important social content and rejected earlier traditions considering them out-of-date. However, the culture politics were reluctant to accept them. One of the earliest political satires, The Witness (A tanú, d: Péter Bacsó, 1969) dealing with the personality cult in the 50s was banned. Let's summarise what we know: those comedies that wanted to entertain and did not dealt with everyday problems were rejected by the ruling power because of their lack on social connotation. Satires and grotesque comedies which - faithfully to their style - criticised the existing social circumstances were politically incorrect. (In the 60s, it was again the tradition of civil comedy between the two wars that served as a source for making commercial films. However, that tradition was not only problematic on ideological base but also got outdated.) The phrase "catch-22" perfectly describes the situation of Hungarian comedy since the 60s. The big losers are no doubt the satire and the grotesque. Let us just take Czechoslovakian new wave for example. A somewhat similar grotesque way of thinking could have been established in Hungarian film art as well - such as it happened on high-level in literature through the writings by István Örkény. Instead, all we can report of is several lonely trials, neglected or banned artists and films. Comedies with social point of views unavoidably (would have been) got close to a satiric or grotesque way of presenting. In one hand, it met the expectations of the ruling power but on the other side it ran into the wall of culture politics. Satire and grotesque are ab ovo "dissident" genres and those in power could hardly - if ever - tolerate that. That could have been the film genre, which could have easily found its way to the audience In addition to information on the genre's history the level of comedies also draws a fine picture of in what ways the ruling power moved in the 60s, 70s and 80s: asking for works that deal with social questions with a critical attitude but meets the audience's expectations proved to be demagogue. Disparaging commercial-film type of comedies proved to be hypocrite. Demanding "avant-garde with mass effect" proved to be cynical. The time of slogans is over - but comedy is still out of stock in Hungarian film art. No one makes good satires about the social events of recent past, why is that? There is nothing to make a film about? I wish it were not. It is more as if the traditions of the genre are missing. It is most typical that in order to achieve success with a comedy one must recall to life the genre's tradition from the 40s. It is still the grotesque, which - from an artistic point of view - is the most valid and useable tool. All we must do is giving it a little "post-modern" push: exaggerating more, making lines stronger and colours brighter. It should get a bit closer to parody and caricature but at the same time it ought to be ironical - so we could even take it seriously. A genre combination like this was created by director Péter Tímár in Dollybirds (Csinibaba, 1997), which is one of the few "squaring the circle" comedies in Hungarian film art. The story that is very entertaining visually, too makes us wonder: why do we have such a good laugh about the 60s that seemed so boring back then that it could not even bring forth one decent comedy by any of the directors in that period.
Márton Keleti: Singing Makes Life Beautiful (1950) 48 KByte
Péter Bacsó: The Witness (1969) 149 KByte
Péter Tímár: Dollybirds (1997) 146 KByte