Birth Centenaries - Directorate of Film Festivals

COMPETITION
Márta Mészáros
(Chairperson)
Márta Mészáros is considered one of Hungary’s
best filmmakers and also one of most significant
woman directors to emerge from central Europe.
She began making films in 1970s drawing on the
oppression of both state and gender. Her two sons,
Nyika Jancsó and Miklós Jancsó Jr., have separately
worked as director of photography on many
of her films. Her critically acclaimed film Napló
apámnak, anyámnak was produced in 1990. She
directed a film about Imre Nagy in 2003-2004,
titled The Unburied Dead.. Meszaros’ work has
directly confronted issues of gender, society, politics
and identity and have been acknowledged
worldwide for its outspoken nature. Mészáros was
born in Hungary, she in 1936 moved to Russia
with her Hungarian parents, who had been lured
there by Stalin’s openness to “fellow travellers”
in his Socialist experiment. Once there, they were
sent to the barren plains of Kyrgyzstan and forced
to forge an existence for themselves. Stalin
changed his mind about these foreigners, though,
and a crackdown soon followed. Mészáros’s
mother died in childbirth and her father vanished
into a concentration camp following a trial. Although
the awful truth of her father’s fate had long
been suspected, it was not until after 1999 that
Mészáros received confirmation from the authorities
that he had been executed. These early traumatic
experiences were to form the basis of her
autobiographical series of “Diary” films during
the 1980s, which broke new ground in Hungarian
cinema in terms of what they showed politically
as well as their being sensitive portrayals
of the petulance of youthful rebellion and the processes
of personal and historical memory. By the
time she made the Diary films, though, Mészáros
was already famous. Her under-production fillm
is Hanna Wende, and earlier she has made films
like A Temetetlen halott (The Unburied Man),
Csodálatos mandarin (The Miraculous
Manderin), Kisvilma - Az utolsó napló (Little
Vilna: The Last Diary), A Szerencse lányai (Córy
szczescia), Siódmy pokój (The Seventh Room), etc.
Her films have won awards at prestigious festivals,
including the ones in Cannes and Berlin.
Meltem Cumbul
(Member)
A noted actor from Turkey, Meltem Cumbul
graduated with a major in drama when she was
21. She then worked as an actress for the
Shakespeare Company in London. Taking on a
career in television, she hosted the reality
programme Aþaðý Yukarý and the game show
Nereden Baºlasak. During this time, Meltem also
played a number of supporting roles in movies,
most notably Bay E and Böcek. In 1996, she
starred in a Sahte Dünyalar, a popular soap opera.
Meltem was given her own show The Meltem
Cumbul Show, a year later. She did leading parts
in the movies Karýþýk Pizza, Geboren in
Absurdistan and the musical Anlat ªehrazat Anlat.
Meltem acted in the popular TV series Biz size
aþýk olduk, Beºik Kertmesi and Gurbet Kadýný.
She also starred in the extremely popular Yilan
Hikayesi, which is to date the highest-rated
programme ever in the history of Turkish television.
Meltem’s role in the movie Abdülhamit
Düserken won her the Golden Orange Prize at the
Antalya Film Festival. She has also acted in the
award-winning and critically- acclaimed movies
Gegen die Wand and Gönül Yarasý. Her latest
films A Beautiful Life and The Alphabet Killer
are getting ready for release soon. She has won
the best actress award at Ankara International
Film Festival in 2000 for the film Durusma , and
the FIPRESCI prize for the best actress at the
Palm Springs International Film Festival for
Gönül yarasi in 2005.
6
Pablo Cesar
(Member)
IFFI-2007
The 1962-born Pablo Cesar has made films like
Blood, Aphrodite (the garden of the perfumes),
Unicorn (the garden of the fruits), Grey Fire,
Equinox and The Holy Family. He has also made
a number of short films. His latest film Hunabku
is being screened in the Cinema of the World section
of this festival as an Asian Premiere. His
earlier films have been widely screened in various
international film festivals in India. Cesar has
also made a large number of short films during
his career, which has also seen him as a Professor
in the University of Cinema of Buenos Aires.