Red Psalm (1972) (Repost)

Red Psalm, or Még kér a nép (literally: "The People Still Ask" ) is one of the great Hungarian film director Miklos Jancso's best-known films. It recounts quite poetically the story of a peasant uprising on an estate in Hungary in the 1890s. It examines the nature of revolt, and the issues of morality and violence. This film uses symbolic imagery and language involving the color red to great effect and was filmed in a virtuoso manner, using only 28 shots. Reviewers reported that Jancso's storytelling technique most closely resembled that used in ballet. The pacifistic peasants, who seek some basic rights, are in a standoff with local authorities and later, the army. Everyone takes a break in the confrontation in order to celebrate a festival. Afterwards, the peasants resume their strike and meet with a tragic end.

IMDB

This is an astonishing movie, one of the few movie experiences I ever had that came close to that of watching an opera on stage. I watched it twice in a row not only for its beautiful takes (it is remarkably made out of 27 takes, at least that's how many I numbered) but for the extraordinary music and set design. This is so unlike any other movie you will see that you will be swept away not knowing what to think. There is a serious amount of red propaganda here, and many sensitive natures will feel offended by one of the characters reciting what should have been Pater Noster but with key phrases replaced with workers manifesto quotes.

As much as it would seem impossible given what is on screen there is actually a story here, only the way it is expressed is not characteristic to the movie forms we have grown accustomed with. In an allegorical manner the images tell the story of a peasant uprising on an estate in Hungary in the late 19th century. The whole thing is staged like a 16th century masque (this movie reminded me somehow of Greenaway's The Baby of Macon in terms of storytelling) with the peasants celebrating harvest and the bolyars coming to take their due only to be met with resistance. The Church then comes to appease the uprising and set the peasants straight only to meet with a similar attitude from the unflinching protesters who want to live in a society articulated after their own rules. The end is tragic as becomes such a story with the rebels being slaughterer by the army.

Needles to say that the movie is sustained by a very elaborate symbolism, only part of which I understood. There is, of course, the pervasive use of the color red, but that's just part of it. There are numerous religious symbols thrown in, I don't really know if the director is an atheist or has a deep relation with God but I tend to favor the latter view. Even if the movie shows the burning of a church, the protest seems to be more directed against the institution of the Church and not religion per se. There are some pagan symbols introduced related especially to the naked virgins shown as symbols of intangible purity and there are also to be found symbols related to the fertility of the land and animals and the Dionysian character of feasts as times of communion with nature.

Overall, I enjoyed this movie like a work of art and I happily look forward to another viewing

IMDB Reviewer

Download:

http://www.filesonic.com/file/78555135/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part1.rar
http://www.filesonic.com/file/78555165/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part2.rar
http://www.filesonic.com/file/78554507/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part3.rar

http://bitshare.com/files/o3qv6ocu/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part1.rar.html
http://bitshare.com/files/znbbhemm/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part2.rar.html
http://bitshare.com/files/e9ppvetp/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part3.rar.html

http://www.fileserve.com/file/mUqKnjZ/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part1.rar
http://www.fileserve.com/file/x8cZXTf/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part2.rar
http://www.fileserve.com/file/gzeQ3B4/Red.Psalm.1972.AH.part3.rar

Interchangable links.