User Reviews

The documentary was, for me, a transformative experience. It is both personal and universal, touching key turning points in 20th century history as well as the hopes, fears and aspirations of the filmmakers family. There is also here a story of intergenerational healing - of reaching back into the suffering experienced by parents and grandparents and acknowledging those experiences in a way that they, themselves, could not articulate.

Do not watch this film is you are merely looking for entertainment. Do watch it if you are open to a profound experience. It is unlike any other film I have seen.

The film begins by providing both a historical and personal view of the Jewish diaspora at the outset of WWII. It explores the complex relationships the Restless Hungarian, Paul Weidlinger, had with his family and some of the most influential artists, architects and engineers in the latter half of the 20th century including Moholy-Nagy, Le Corbusier, Dubuffet and many others who greatly influenced modern day art and architecture. The film also details the engineering relationship Weidlinger had with the Rand Corporation and their efforts to design and build structures that would protect U. S. nuclear missiles. I highly recommend this historical and deeply personal film.

Fathers-and-sons is a deep theme in literature and film, and Tom Weidlinger makes it new--exploring the ambiguity of his own relationship with his accomplished father, a man who neglected the home as most of that generation's fathers did, but whose impact on the next generation was perhaps greater as a result--the focus of fantasy and frustration--and even of political dismay at some of his and his generation's choices on issues of art and technology--especially the Bomb. Dorothy Dinnerstein writes about how fathers get off the hook as distant figures of fantasy while mothers bear the burden of a child's need for separation. But in this case, Tom doesn't let his father get away with it so easy. Love and accountability are a tough negotiation, and here Director/Son Weidlinger gives the Father uneasy justice. A complex and beautiful film.

This is a deeply moving film, and while it's a family story, specific to its own time and circumstance, it touches a universal nerve. In addition, the filmmaking is masterly. There is remarkable archival footage that never hammers the viewer with trite or clichéd meanings. Also remarkable are the sites (or remnants) on three continents of the Weidlinger family's landmarks. And most remarkable for me are the eloquent reenactments of family scenes: like rooms in a dollhouse with a minimum of decor, they convey the maximum of psychic distress. They're mysterious, in some cases almost mystical. In fact, the entire film has an aura of mystery and beauty.

Here is a 20-tieth century story of one more brilliant world-famous Hungarian. However one can hardly find people who know his name in Hungary today. He was not accepted in his homeland. He had to leave Europe to save his mere life. He found an asylum and reached fame on the other side of the world. But the price he had to pay was high... I think this beautiful, honest and deeply moving film is worth seeing for all interested in history, culture, biographies and family stories. I find this an unconventional documentary full of dramatic and artistic elements. As a Hungarian I especially liked in it to see my country through the eyes of an American brave and devoted to explore.

Occasionally a film comes along which covers a multitude of topics and yet weaves them into a coherent and compelling story. What starts as a reflection on a personal crisis quickly explodes into a layered exploration of the history of a century, seen through the eyes of fascinating people form three continents and many walks of life. While it stays firmly on the tracks of an engrossing family history, its many sidings visit such topics as war, avant-garde art, the holocaust, architecture, bohemian life, immigration, adventure and travel, mental health and identity. And while all of this sounds like too much to fit in one story, each of these gets its due attention through rounded and skillful direction, so that the film seems to end only too quickly, in spite of its feature length.

Tom Weidlinger's cinematic biography of his father, Paul, is a complex film that touches upon a number of familiar themes, such as Europe between the World Wars, the Holocaust, anti-Semitism, and the rewards and stresses of emigration.

Paul Weidlinger's essential contributions to urban monumental architecture and sculpture tend to be obscured by the names of the world-famous architects and artists who designed the works that were erected with the expertise of Weidlinger's structural engineering firm.

Paul Weidlinger is presented as an energetic, highly gifted egotist, whose path through life had heartrending consequences for his family. In this regard, the film can be compared to other biographies of famous parents created by their children, and it raises the question of what do offspring owe their parents, particularly those who abused them.

The film is well constructed and beautifully photographed. The reenactments, which Tom Weidlinger often includes in his films, are a perfect touch. Watch the film and then replay the images as you read the excellent book that accompanies it.

In this riveting hybrid documentary, filmmaker Tom Weidlinger pursues his quest to truly know and understand his father, Paul, a successful, Hungarian-born structural engineer who helped build many of the great architectural works of the 20th century. At the heart of the enigma the film attempts to resolve is the issue of Paul Weidlinger's hidden Jewish identity, which Columbia University film professor Annette Insdorf references as a "growing sub-genre of Holocaust cinema." Employing a wealth of archival material and interviews with his father as well as those who knew him in Hungary, France, Bolivia and the U. S., Tom Weidlinger documents his father's perception of himself as a self-invented, creative intellectual, radically distanced from traditions - Jewish and otherwise -- despite the wartime suffering of his Hungarian Jewish family. Was this a flight or a rejection, a disguise or mere disinterest in his origins? Did his metamorphosis contribute to his constructing an edifice around his emotional self? And what, finally, was his grown son supposed to do with this discovery?

Dramatic reenactments of childhood memories, enhanced by the filmmaker's thoughtful, introspective narration, help to explore the space between Paul Weidlinger's public persona, his factual accomplishments and his emotional impact on his family. Ultimately, the film ponders how one integrates the infinite complexity of a parent's life -- including their impact on our own.

Building on the research for his 2019 book, "The Restless Hungarian: Modernism, Madness and the American Dream", the film is just as informative but far more emotive, yielding a deep personal payoff at its exquisitely narrated end.

This film beautifully explores a grown-up child's discovery of his parents' past, a discovery that explains his own traumatic childhood experience as well as those of his parents. Weidlinger keeps us in suspense throughout as he peels back each layer of the onion allowing us to experience his revelations as if they were our own. This film touches the heart and will undoubtedly become a classic. A visual feature includes the documentarian's travels throughout the world of his father -- Hungary, Paris, Ecuador, Cape Cod, and Manhattan -- and dramatic re-enactments of family scenes that bring the past into even sharper focus.

Tom Weidlinger's Restless Hungarian opens as a tale of Jewish struggle in the lead up to WWII, but quickly focuses on the adventurous life brought about by Paul's (the director's father) sheer force of will. Like the brewing war in the foreground, Paul's life unfolds before us in fits of psychological battle, tactical retreat, and strategic armistice.

The participation of the director as both biographical orator and emotionally entangled character within the story could have detracted for the precision of the telling. To the contrary, Tom's personal quest for understanding seamlessly intertwines with his father's story. In the end, both men will be judged well by the feats they achieved.

This film captures the uncertainty and disembodiment caused by abandonment; losing faith that one deserves a healthy relationship, making one's way alone in the world, and searching for connection. The story is told through Tom Weidlinger's quest to understand his father, Paul Weidlinger's, life and motivations. I was struck by both Tom and Paul's resilience under extreme adversity, their creativity in finding solutions, their dedications to their craft, their reach for beauty, and the dysfunction that wreaked havoc on the people around them. In addition, I gained an intimate insight into the culture and events that shaped the world leading up to World War II. The soaring glimpse of the Joy of Space through the images of the buildings that Paul brought to the world truly inspired me.