Do Non-Hungarians get theese symbols?
The movie is more popular ouside Hungary, but many viewers don't know Hungarian history and might just see it as a perverted family saga and their grotesque relationship with body, meat and flesh.
This movie is not just an "art movie + Saw+ Se7en" (Lust at first, then Gluttony, which becomes Sloth after the fall of communism and Pride by the youngest boy, the Taxdermist)
This is also (just like Axis Powers Hethalia) a representation of a country's history: main characters reflect the country's situation.
Why does the pig-sodomist die, before the fat man is born? Because the Fascist Hungary was defeated before the Communist was created. (Yes, the first third of the movie is about NAZIS, just like in "Salo" by P. Pasolini.)
Germans invaded the country in 1944. The perversion symbolises the Fascist madness. When it was the strongest (the sex with the pig-woman), it was shot down rapidly (early '45).
The communism gave the country a new constitution, in 1949. Hence the Discontinuity- the father dies before the son is born, they have a different family name: Balatoni, not Morozsgoványi.
Fat women represent wealth, goods. In fascism, it was forbidden (Jewish property) in communism, countries were competing for it, and Hungary "won", so it became the Happiest Barrack, Goulash Communism. In capitalism, after 1990: no woman, no money- she went to the USA (compare to multinational companies, which take out the money from the country).
The old sick fart is still living in the capitalism- it symbolises, that the communist elite remained rich, but they are depending on the capitalist generation (the son goes to the supermarket for supply). Unlike the 1940s, there is a continuity here in history. The family name remains the same- Hungary still has its 1949 constitution. To maintain the position of the old communists, people are still under pressure, like the taxidermist.
Hungary is in serious IMF financial debt because of the communists.
The youngest generation has no future- they are working for the orders of Western capital. They cant make children- Hungary's population is declining since 1981, from 10.8 million to under 10 million.
Hungary is weak (like the body of the taxidermist) and the only thing it can do to preserve himself: Hungarian museums, art, culture is about being remembered and being known in the West.
Just like this very movie. We know that we don't have future. Hungary's never made any sci-fi movie, and in literature we never write about the future of Hungary, because we know that it doesn't exist.
Like the taxidermist, we want to preserve the past now and we want the West to look at us and study us and remember us and learn from our self-destroying mistakes.
The stuffed human is a symbol of the Taxidermia movie itself, and the snubbish crowd in white helds a mirror to the film festivals and the Western art-movie-loving audience, who like the whole thing - even when they just understand a little part of it. (Because they don't care about this insignificant little country.)