Hic

Original title: Hukkle

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Using almost no dialogue, the film follows a number of residents (both human and animal) of a small rural community in Hungary - an old man with hiccups, a shepherdess and her sheep, an old ... Read allUsing almost no dialogue, the film follows a number of residents (both human and animal) of a small rural community in Hungary - an old man with hiccups, a shepherdess and her sheep, an old woman who may or may not be up to no good, some folk-singers at a wedding, etc. While most... Read allUsing almost no dialogue, the film follows a number of residents (both human and animal) of a small rural community in Hungary - an old man with hiccups, a shepherdess and her sheep, an old woman who may or may not be up to no good, some folk-singers at a wedding, etc. While most of the film is a series of vignettes, there is a sinister and often barely perceptible su... Read all

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.0/10

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 17 wins & 5 nominations total

Photos4

User reviews31

7.04K

Featured reviews

meitschi

Eating and being eaten

I am happy that so many people from different countries have liked this Hungarian film - which is quite rare. I loved it, it is very cool, innovative and fascinating. The photography and sound design are excellent. I think it is not by chance that the first member of the crew named in the opening credits is precisely the sound designer.

You have to have some patience to get really into the film, but afterward, it is really worth it. Lots of black humor about eating and being eaten. In fact, eating does not mean anything good in this film...

The morale of the story is well summarized in the closing folksong "Ki az urát nem szereti" (Who does not love her husband). The only time where words are used in this film to say something....

And yes: "Hukkle" does not mean anything on Hungarian, it is an onomatopoetic (sound-imitating) word that imitates the sound of a hickup. (The real Hungarian word for hickup is "csuklás".)

10amzo

Ingenious film sans dialogue

There is something very mesmorizing about the rythmic hiccuping of an old man and the shots of pastoral Hungary. But that is not all the film is about. This debut film by Gyorgy Palfi hopefully is the first of many great films. At first this film may seem like a documentary about daily life in a small village, yet it becomes much more, and if you don't pay attention, you may miss the underlying story of a murder mystery. Also, the contrast of country life and technology is shown subtly.

At our showing of Hukkle at the SF International Film Festival, we were lucky enough to have the director present and he answered questions about the film. Though this film is fiction, the underlying occurences actually happened in a small village in Hungary in the 1900s.

Wonderful cinematography, beautiful scenery, unique sounds, and an original idea all contribute to making this film awe-inspiring.

insomnia

hypnotic

The setting for this most unsettling of films from 27 year old director, Gyorgy Palfi, is a tiny village somewhere in Hungary. The scene is one of bucolic

boredom - at least that's what you might think, if you don't pay attention. We see an old man sitting outside his house: he has the hiccups. We see a girl feeding a dog while listening to music through a headset. Men play a game of skittles. A man herds a pig down a street. Woman busily at work in a clothing factory. A

husband and wife and their children, sit down to lunch. A mole burrows, and

hens peck for worms. Palfi's camera lovingly observes these rituals of everyday life: farm machinery, insects at work, flowers blossoming, a lone jet fighter screams overhead. Pigs mate, meals are carefully prepared, then hungrily

consumed. A body lays rotting on the bottom of a lake, while above, a couple

fish for their dinner. A cat dies of poison meant for humans. People die. Funerals are held. There is a serial killer about. There is no dialogue, but the soundtrack teems with a veritable chorus of machinery whirring, bees humming, pigs

grunting, moles scratching. Never does one's attention flag during the film's economical 75 minutes running time. This is one 'out of the box', allright. 7 out of 10

9plaidpotato

Wow. Great film.

It's hard to describe this film. It's quite unique. The closest I can compare it to are maybe the Cremaster films of Mathew Barney, but it's really something all of its own.

Hukkle is kind of a symphony of sights and sounds, without any real dialogue. It's just rhythms and patterns and cause and effect, and it's very very cool. Often funny, often disturbing, always fascinating. It's sort of like a nature documentary, with humans as just one of the subjects, just one part of the ecosystem. And underneath it all, there's a strange murder mystery.

I saw this film as part of the Seattle International Film Festival. I hope it gets a wider release, because I'd like to see it again. I want to work out some of the details that I missed the first time through.

mario-rad

is something this good possible?

Well, this is something truly original. And I mean it in every possible positive way. Nothing but a praise for a director who gave us some amazing and spectacular directing. Cinematography itself is a pure piece of art, something very rarely seen on screen. "Hukkle" is cinematic experience that looks like the greatest (mute) documentary ever put on celluloid, but if you concentrate just a little more, you'll notice that this is actually a serial killer thriller... Not just a surprise of the year, but maybe the best movie of the year.