Abstract
Hungarian director István Szabó’s films usually feature the story of a young man on his way to becoming an adult during turbulent times in Hungarian history. Strangely enough, however, these stories are framed both visually and narratively in the presence of some female character—the plots, in fact, derive from the actions and decisions of these females. Zoltán Dragon’s paper charts the underlying narrative and visual design in one of the best-known films made by Szabó, Sunshine, identifying the pattern of visual storytellingwhose anchor point is one specific female figure, Vali, in the background. Vali’s role as a focalizing agency is to frame the predominantly male story and reveal the hidden or silenced content that creates an alternative family story.
Highlights
Hungarian director István Szabó’s films usually feature the story of a young man on his way to becoming an adult during turbulent times in Hungarian history
While in classical Hollywood narratives the female character has in some ways an objectified presence and acts as either a hindrance or an object of conquest for the male protagonist, for Szabó the appearance of a female character frames the male narrative on a visual level
The female character in a typically classical Hollywood narration would be regarded as an objectified and disempowered figure, but in the case of Vali, her very appearance in the plot combined with her actions endow her with the creative agency that is signified by her embracing of photography, the creation of images and——the framing of events, a career path that radically diverges from the family’s interests
Summary
Hungarian director István Szabó’s films usually feature the story of a young man on his way to becoming an adult during turbulent times in Hungarian history. While Sunshine seemingly continues tripling the focal male characters, it does so in one film, as well as in a very different diegetic structure which is based on the introduction of female agency in the construction of the narrative design.
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