After The Day Before in VARIETY

AFTER THE DAY BEFORE

Masnap

(Hungary)

A Eurofilm Studio production. (International sales: Magyar Filmunio, Budapest.) Produced by Peter Miskolczi. Directed by Attila Janisch. Screenplay, Andras Forgach.

Stranger - Tibor Gaspar
Romek - Denes Ujlaki
Woman on Lonely Farm - Kati Lazar
Young Girl - Bori Derzsi
Simon - Sandor Czeczo

By EDDIE COCKRELL


A wandering stranger may or may not be involved with a brutal murder in the astonishingly unclassifiable thriller "After the Day Before." Magyar helmer Attila Janisch eschews linear narrative in favor of a kind of waking dream state that is cumulatively creepy and ultimately terrifying. This is uncompromising, risk-taking contemporary Euro arthouse filmmaking at its best, and as such will be in great demand at festivals. Less certain is pic's commercial fate in mainstream play, though brave distribs shouldn't tarry in tracking down a print: Word-of-mouth both yea and nay among upscale auds will be formidable.This unsettling item, which Janisch says is about "the psychology of sin," summons feelings and images from work as diverse as Bram Stoker's "Dracula," the canon of experimental icon Maya Deren and Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining."

Dressed in a vest, tie and gabardine raincoat in spite of the boiling hot weather, a stranger gets off a truck in the middle of a rock-strewn, yet verdant, countryside and accepts a dilapidated bicycle from the driver. The visitor is searching for his inheritance, the apparently abandoned Gruber farm. He has no map or point of reference to guide him, only a faded photograph in a cigarette case.

"Don't rely on people helping you here," someone warns him early on, and that turns out to be true. Remaining absurdly over-dressed and toting a battered valise, the newcomer soon encounters Romek (Denes Ujlaki), who is irate over an apparent rendezvous between a young girl (Bori Derzsi) and the sullen Simon (Sandor Czeczo).

As the oddly calm stranger embarks on a zigzagging two-wheeled odyssey back and forth across the landscape, things just aren't adding up. What's with the local woman who lodged him that first night, and her daughter who sneaks in demanding that he kill her? And the strange dreams he's having? The severed lamb's head? The rooms that appear to be torture chambers? The Billie Holiday tune that wafts across the fields? And, who is this murdered young girl everyone mentions?

Time becomes suspended, then shuffled, then irrelevant. Shattering climax rejects gore but is most definitely not for the faint of heart.

Janisch has been down this provocative path before, having directed "Long Twilight" from Shirley Jackson's short story, "The Bus," in 1996. His first feature since then, "After the Day Before" required, per helmer, several years of location scouting alone to come up with the sinister topography that plays a major role in pic's mood of profound disquiet.

Pic's complex imagery, courtesy of Andras Forgach's script, is dense in its preordained inevitability but never predictable, despite a distinct loss of momentum at about the 80-minute mark.

Lead Tibor Gaspar, a provincial theater talent making a physically demanding first film, has the perfect face and head for the many reaction shots required. Thesp's frightening mix of wonder and terror lends credence to the entire story as an unstoppable and uncontrollable dream. Teenager Bori Derzsi doesn't have much to do until the brutal denouement, enduring her fate with a heartbreaking helplessness in the face of pure evil.

Tech credits are top-of-the-line. Pre-existing musical selections, particularly the climactic Arvo Part composition, complement the action as well as any of the classical pieces employed by Kubrick to drive poor Jack Torrance crazy.

Pic just won the - Main Prize - Best Cinematography - Best Actor - Best Supporting Actress awards at the Hungarian Film Week.

Camera (color), Gabor Medvigy; editor, Anna Kornis; music, Arvo Part, Schachram Poursoundmand, Hans Mittendorf; production designer, Attila F. Kovacs; costume designer, Zsuzsa Megyesi; sound (Dolby Digital), Istvan Sipos. Reviewed at Hungarian Film Week (competing), Budapest, Feb. 1, 2004. Running time: 120 MIN.

Date in print: Mon., Feb. 16, 2004