Budapester Frühling

Budapesti Tavasz was produced in 1954, nine years after the events depicted in the film. Its optimistic ending seemed to signal that the Hungarians were made peace with their past. It didn't. However, the film remains powerful, even 80 years after its production. Romantic drama, war epic, the action takes place in the last days of 1944, during the Battle of Budapest, when Hungary was governed by its fascist Arrow Cross party, allied with Nazi Germany while the Soviet army advanced, causing the German army to retreat.

Two young students, Zoltán and Jutka, find themselves in the same flat during a bombing raid. He's a deserter from the Hungarian army and a student of history and she, a Jew, prevented from pursuing her studies because she is Jewish and living in the flat hidden by the boy's relatives. The passion between the two and the tragedy that follows in the midst of this scenario is the subject of the film. The horrors of war are present, the deportation, the persecution of the Jews, the capital being bombed, man to man, building to building, Russian tanks advancing on the Nazis, members of the Arrow Cross stealing middle-class belongings, all of this in grandiose sets that faithfully reproduce the city and its subsequent destruction. At the same time, the film is light, full of humour, has a very well-written script, an acid criticism of totalitarianism and a message of peace.