Miklós Jancsó-Még kér a nép ('Red Psalm') (1972)

In the 19th century, farmers from South-Eastern Hungary, tired of being oppressed, rebel against their masters and wait for answers to their demands. (-DVD cover)




The master of the land tries to tempt them with food and the gendarmes to threaten them but to no use. All power holders and their representatives (the count himself, the army, the clergy) successively try to intervene and fail. The rebellion takes on the appearance of a celebration at the very moment when it is at its strongest: the peasants sing and dance around the May tree, a symbol of fertility and spring, and new songs come to life: the red psalms. (-DVD cover)




Red Psalm, or Még kér a nép (literally: "The People Still Ask") is one of the great Hungarian film director Miklos Jancso's best-known films. It recounts quite poetically the story of a peasant uprising on an estate in Hungary in the 1890s. It examines the nature of revolt, and the issues of morality and violence. This film uses symbolic imagery and language involving the color red to great effect and was filmed in a virtuoso manner, using only 28 shots. (www.amazon.com)




Reviewers reported that Jancso's storytelling technique most closely resembled that used in ballet. The pacifistic peasants, who seek some basic rights, are in a standoff with local authorities and later, the army. Everyone takes a break in the confrontation in order to celebrate a festival. Afterwards, the peasants resume their strike and meet with a tragic end. (www.amazon.com)