Release Date: 24 October 2011Miklós Jancsó is one of cinema's greatest visionaries and Red Psalm is a formidable work of art from a master filmmaker at the peak of his powers.
Depicting a series of peasant uprisings in Hungary in the late 19th century, the film celebrates the cause of revolutionary struggle. Inspired by folklore and song, Jancsó's camera travels amongst groups of moving figures in an elaborate cinematic ballet and his
singular use of film form achieves a resonance and beauty that is extraordinary.
Radical in execution and poetic in its achievement, Red Psalm reaches beyond political dogma to expose a more universal, and deeper, truth that remains relevant today.
• Message of Stones (A kövek üzenete) – Hegyalja: The third film in Miklós Jancsó's renowned but rarely seen documentary series Message of Stones.
• Brand new anamorphic 16:9 digital transfer with restored image and sound, approved by the director.
• New and improved English subtitle translation.
• 20-page booklet featuring an expansive new essay by
author and film programmer Peter Hames.
• Optimal quality dual-layer disc.
• Available for the first time on DVD in the English speaking world.
Andrea Drahota - Militant girl
Lajos Balazsovits - Sympathetic officer
András Bálint - Count
Gyöngyi Bürös - young peasant woman
with Jószef Madaras, Tibor Molnár, Tibor Orbán, Bertalan Soltir
Directed by Miklós Jancsó
Screenplay - Gyula Hernádi
Cinematography - János Kende
Music - János Gonda
Art direction - Tamás Banovich
Costume design - Erzsébet Mialkovszky
Editor - Zoltán Farkas
Choreography - Ferenc Pesovár
Sound - György Pintér
Music - Tamás Cseh
Miklós Jancsó's renowned films The Red and the White,
My Way Home, The Round-Up, The Confrontation and
Electra, My Love are also available on Second Run.
The Red and the White,
My Way Home and The Round-Up are also available in the 3-disc Miklós Jancsó Collection Box Set.
1972 Cannes Film Festival / Winner: Best Director
"An awesome fusion of form with content and politics
with poetry... May well be the greatest Hungarian film
of the 60s and 70s" Jonathan Rosenbaum
"A formidable work of art on its own terms... it's an extraordinary film, and certainly Jancsó's most immediately intoxicating" Kinoblog
"The technical and conceptual virtuosity on display here is staggering. It's a great work from a true original"
Michael Brooke, MovieMail
"Considered to be the best film by the best filmmaker to come out of Hungary" Saatchi Online
"He occupies a unique place in Hungarian culture. If he hadn't made such films as The Round-Up, My Way Home, The Red and the White, and others, there would have been a void.
Just like Bartók in music and Attila József in poetry, Miklós Jancsó expressed the spirit of his nation and its historical destiny in cinema" István Szabó
