Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time

This Hungarian film is a slow-burning little gem. It balances itself somewhere between mysterious, psychological thriller and slyly satirical, deadpan comedy. And the amazing thing is you don't really notice what a number it has done on you until well after it's finished. Natasa Stork plays Márta, a successful neurosurgeon who decides to return home to Budapest to meet up with the man she met and fell in love with at a medical conference in the US. A planned rendezvous on a bridge doesn't eventuate and so Márta tracks down János, played by Viktor Bodó, to his hospital, whereupon he claims to have never met her in his life. Is he lying? Is she losing her mind? Could it be both? These questions are played with through the film and, though on the surface, they are answered, there's still lingering doubt about events just passed and crucially, preparations for the future.

The final shot is an absurd flourish, reminiscent of a few Coen Brothers films, and close to a belly laugh in that there are a few ways to read it (Roly and I immediately took different views on it). Without describing the actual visual, I'll simply say that interpretations of regret, instability, chaos and maybe even the shock of mature reality are all on the table. 

The two leads are great, and special mention must go to Benett Vilmányi as a well-meaning, lovestruck Alex, but it's Stork who holds the attention here. It's a cracking performance - we're not sure if she's fully looped, truculent, depressed or calculating, with slight changes of expression on her otherwise impassive face giving only minor clues away. As her psychologist says to her, "I think you want me to diagnose a mental disorder rather than have to think that your lover cheated on you."

Director Lili Horvát, in only her second feature, has given us a film that sets up puzzlers and doesn't quite give us all the answers. It's a clever, cool looking film that only the Eastern Europeans can really pull off. This awkward, Fry & Laurie-style translation of Janós singing as a child sums up the film for me, "The thief lost patience and made the brook obscure with crafty agitations." 

Yep, just what he said. 

Preparations to Be Together for an Unknown Period of Time opens at the Luna on October 7th.

See also:

I got vibes of Michelangelo Antonioni's Blow Up (1966), as well as Denis Villeneuve's Enemy (2013), not to mention a few Coen Brothers films.