User Reviews

Filmed, like all of Tarr's work, in black & white this gem of a movie, to our western eyes, looks as though it were filmed in the 50s at the very latest, but this is in fact Hungary in 1981, and shot on a shoestring budget. The film is about a relationship, about a couple scraping by, living in hard times, with two kids to feed. But whilst this is beginning to sound a bit like a Magyar "Cathy Come Home", stop right there! In Loach's film, Cathy and Reg are very much in love, but it it circumstances beyond their control that drive a wedge through them. In "Panelkapcsolat", it is themselves.

Whilst it is clear that they do love one another - or she loves him, at least - neither husband Robi nor his wife (whose name, I believe, we are never given) can blame anyone other than themselves for their lot. He is beginning to see the value of what he regards as "socialism" over communism, but has more time for his friends and his work colleagues than for his wife. Greed is a factor that appears in many of Tarr's movies, even his latest ("The Man from London"). However, Robi's wife, whilst certainly not greedy, is not faultless herself, as she cannot see - until it is too late - that her constant nagging is driving them apart. Or is it too late? One of the interesting techniques of this movie is that Tarr plays around with the chronology. We see the couple arguing, we see them enjoying (albeit for a short while) a tender moment at their 9th wedding anniversary, we see them argue again, we see them in bed. If we assume that the film is filmed chronologically, then it's a happy ending - of sorts (he still gets his way with the Minimat 65). It could quite plausibly be meant to be chronological, after all, we see Robi 'leave' his wife at the start of the film, and we see him leave again - presumably for Romania - in the film's dénouement. At first, we think that the second departure scene is the same as the first, but there are differences in dialogue, which makes one think that perhaps he has left - and returned - many times, hence the final scene is after he has returned - the next day, perhaps.

However, I am fairly sure that we are not meant to take this film chronologically. The film jumps backwards and forwards all over the place, and the final scene in the back of the truck is from happier days, perhaps from when they first moved in together. But Robi's stubbornness in not going for the automatic washing-machine, which his wife would have preferred, shows that their marital journey ahead will be as bumpy as the road they are travelling on in back of the truck.

Cleverly, the viewer is therefore free to turn this wonderful piece of celluloid into whatever he or she wants. I cannot imagine anyone not being completely mesmerised by this film. That Tarr can produce masterpieces of any length, from a relatively short film like this one, to the 7 and a half hour long "Sátántangó", shows that he is a very special director indeed. He is brilliant at capturing moments that others would not even notice. One such moment is halfway through the film, where Robi drunkenly sings the theme to the Godfather and a Hungarian version of "Autumn Leaves", we think (hope!) that he is directing the words to his wife, but end up being quite mistaken. As the camera pans between wife, husband, and musician, we realise that we are watching something quite special indeed.

Let us hope that, now that Tarr has finally finished "The Man from London" after so many years, that he will make more films more regularly, and not leave us on our own for so many years.

Bela Tarr began his career making gritty social dramas which centred on the lives of working class Hungarians. Whilst his later films are slow, metaphysical and immaculately composed, Tarr's early films were shot entirely with hand held cameras, and strove for a kind of "kitchen sink" realism very much akin to the British and French New Wave.

A little over an hour long, "The Prefab People" is one of Tarr's shortest films. Reminiscent of Cassavettes, the film focuses on a young couple who struggle to make ends meet, the husband working at a local power plant whilst his wife stays home, dutifully tending to their two kids. Usually these Hungarian films take aim at socialism, trade unions and the post-Soviet government, blaming the collective unhappiness of the middle class on various institutional factors, but Tarr sidesteps these issues entirely. Humans are innately alienated and unhappiness, Tarr says, is the condition of modern consciousness.

And so Tarr immediately zeroes in on the existential problems of these two characters. The husband struggles to find meaning in his job, believing himself to be "just a button pusher" the world "going on even if he's not there". Similarly, the wife moans about having to constantly supervise the kids, having no money and never spending quality time with her husband. But what is quality time? What is money? What is there of substance outside the 4 walls of their home?

Elsewhere Tarr takes aim at materialism and leisure. He emphasises the banality of human conversation, human acquisition, human pleasure and pokes fun at the way man clings desperately to the class ladder, believing that just one more appliance, just one more object, will bring him happiness. Observe how late in the film the characters discuss whether or not they can afford a car. They can't. And so they buy the next best thing: a washing machine. Maybe next year they'll get the car. Surely then they'll be happy.

It's not a question of illuminating why post-revolution Hungary is unhappy or highlighting what social and psychological factors contribute to this unhappiness (though the film deftly does just that), but in exposing the inherent futility of this type of existence. It will always be unfulfilling, not because the rules of the game are unfair, but because the game itself is unwinnable; radically change your values, alter your perceptions.

The way the couple cope with their problems is illuminating. The husband buries himself in alcohol and tries to stay away from home as much as possible, goofing off with his friends and hiding from his kids. The wife, in contrast, turns to sex and a kind of needy dependency. She believes that if her husband "pays more attention to her" their problems will be solved. Today, coping mechanisms take the form of electronic distractions, food, fads, films, drugs and TV, but Tarr's point is the same.

The film was praised in its day for being remarkably perceptive, highlighting the problems of life in 1980s Hungary, but Tarr's pessimism is broader. His is a cinema of hopelessness, his camera perhaps not empathising with the couple, but rather nauseated by the universe in which they live.

8.5/10 – Worth one viewing.