Electra, My Love

In December 1975 I saw this film, together with two of South Africa's leading actors, in Paris. A Hungarian film with French subtitles! A great deal of the nuance of dialogue therefore escaped me. Yet, the mastery was unmistakable. This was my first trip to Europe (unlike my friends with whom I teamed up in Paris and who had been around several times before.) I had just experienced Pier Poalo Passolini's Oedipe Re in Zurich and a Mauro Bolognini film, Per le Antiche Scale (Down The Ancient Staircase) in Milan. Great stuff.

But Jancso's Elektreia (or Electra, my Love) just begged for another viewing and I expressed the wish that the film would be showing in London (our next stop.) Lo and behold! It was on in London with English subtitles. After two more visits I realised I will never get enough of the film. It is a classic,modern in its portrayal and ageless in its storytelling. It defies description, because it is dance drama, classic theatre, melodrama and modern politics all wrapped into one. The pain it brings the viewer is frightening. It is one of those films where every shot is a painting that belongs in a gallery, without the camera work becoming pretentious. And the acting is brilliant. Thank you master Jancso! This is available on DVD and although perhaps not Jancso's greatest work, a must for the collector of serious cinema.

More like a play filmed on a barren plain, this movie is marked by long takes and constant motion of people and horses in the background. A nice re-telling of the wait for Orestes' homecoming blending anachronistic props and ancient rituals seeming to come from "Le Sacre du Printemps." Constant dancing and mass movement of horses with the the drumming of the hoofbeats and the gunshot cracks of whips makes sound a character itself and adds tension to the whole movie. Avoid this unless you like art films and the unusual.

Those viewers who are familiar with director Miklos Jansco's better-known films ("The Round-Up," "The Red and the White," "Winter Wind") may find this adaptation of Euripides' Electra takes a bit of getting used to at first. Jansco's earlier films were noted for very long takes and fluid staging in a realistic mise en scene. Here the long takes and fluid staging are used, but the production is more "theatrical," i.e., the costuming is simple, and instead of a bare stage there is a vast steppe in Eastern Europe, with only a few spare structures as sets. It is as if a stage production using contemporary techniques were opened up and presented on an estate, complete with throngs of extras (many of them sans clothing), horsemen riding about, and a roving minstrel. However odd the initial effect may be in terms of conventional expectations, it makes for a mostly intriguing treatment of a classic text.

In fact, this production probably conveys more of a sense of the impact of the ancient Greek plays than stripped-down stage presentations: the Greeks used music, dance and mass movement of the chorus in their staging, after all.

Jansco adds to this with the camera's ability to move in and out of the action, so that within a single long take there are sequences of grandeur and swirling action and then moments of intimate exchanges. The whole experience is one of a theatrical presentation aiming for universality in its approach being complemented and enriched by the versatility of cinematic techniques.

The cinematography is a marvel of technique; the color is pleasantly muted

That being said, the screenwriter appends some contemporary political musings that may strike viewers as either appropriately idyllic (and idealistic) or jarringly naive.

For those who are familiar with the play and/or the director's other work, this film ought to be a pleasure to behold, whatever one may make of the artistic kneadings the material has been subjected to.

The Euripides drama is played here on an expansive flat field. Hundreds of participants, a couple dozen horses, pheasants and pigeons move and dance over that terrain while the camera tracks through the crowd. It's a choreography tour de force, especially considering the film is made of about a dozen long takes.

Keeping in mind this was done during the communist regime, the story plays as political metaphor. This is particularly obvious as a modern encumbrance accompanied by a modern text closes the play.

The film I saw had washed out colors. I suspect this may not be in the original, but a sign of an aging reel. Nonetheless, the resulting sepia-ish tinge doesn't diminish the viewer's enjoyment.

If you don't know Jancso's work, I'd recommend starting with either this film, or with the masterpiece THE ROUND UP. Whereas THE ROUND UP combines Jancso's unique and impressive shooting style with a compelling narrative, ELEKTRA is more impressionistic... like a strange, continuously flowing film-ballet, it comes across like a sombre musical, an ancient Greek play transformed into an unusual ritual on the Hungarian plain. At 75 minutes, it is a distillation of Jansco's style, a brief, inspiring introduction to this unique artist.