Directed by Zoltán Fábri • 1956 • Hungary

Zoltán Fábri’s dizzying romance marked a turning point in post-war Hungarian cinema when it premiered at Cannes in 1956. Based on a novel by Imre Sarkadi, the film charts the travails of Mari (a star-making turn from Mari Törőcsik), a peasant girl betrot...

Directed by Zoltán Fábri • 1971 • Hungary

Zoltán Fábri’s wickedly allegorical “nunsploitation” classic is a coming-of-age tale, an anticlerical satire, and a political parable wrapped up into one. Adapted from Margit Kaffka’s 1917 novel of the same name, Ants’ Nest is set in convent where the im...

Directed by Attila Dargay • 1977 • Hungary

A classic of Hungarian animation from the legendary Pannónia studio, Attila Dargay’s charming take on one of the nation’s favourite folk myths doubles as a playful anti-authoritarian rebuke. Following a cunning young goose shepherd in his efforts to get...

Directed by Ivo Trajkov • 2022 • Slovakia

Ivo Trajkov’s exquisitely eerie blend of period drama and folk horror explores the dark depths of patriarchal cruelty and nationalist fervour. Told in a series of flashbacks, the film recounts the last days of the rural Slovak village of Piargy. The powe...

Directed by Andrzej Wajda • 1975 • Poland

Adapted from the classic novel by Nobel laureate Władysław Reymont, Andrzej Wajda’s The Promised Land is a stunning period epic about Poland’s painful transition to industrial modernity. In late nineteenth-century Łódź, three friends – one Polish, one Je...

Directed by Tadeusz Konwicki • 1958 • Poland

Tadeusz Konwicki’s austere but beautiful examination of life in the aftermath of tragedy is one of the most exacting early masterpieces of the Polish Film School. Made with a crew of just five, with no artificial lighting and no sets, the film unfolds...

Directed by Wojciech Marczewski • 1981 • Poland

Wojciech Marczewski’s chilling, beguiling sophomore feature transports the classic coming-of-age tale to 1950s Poland. Following his father’s arrest, 13-year old Tomek (Tomasz Hudziec) is sent to a youth camp designed to indoctrinate future Communi...

Directed by Gergő Somogyvári • 2023 • Hungary

Fanni is a 19-year-old trans woman kicked out by her family, Laci a 60-year-old homeless man. Together, they create their own domestic world – their “Fairy Garden” – in the woods outside Budapest. Shot over more than three years, Gergő Somogyvári’s t...