Stars: Peter Rudolf, Bence Tasnadi, Tamas Szabo Kimmel, Dora Sztarenki
Director: Ferenc Torok
Oscar History: No Nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 5/5 stars
(BIG Spoilers Ahead) The film, like I said, is told in seemingly real time, with multiple different storylines merging. We are told that a wedding, between the son (Tasnadi) of the town clerk (Rudolf) and a beautiful, albeit considerably poorer, girl named Kisrozsi (Sztanrenki). The town clerk, Mr. Istvan, is a powerful but bullying man, and one who has clearly done something terrible in his past that we learn as the film unfolds. The village upended when two Jews come to the city with a mysterious box, marching toward a fate unknown as the entire town, rife with conspiracies and anti-semitism toward the two men, starts to become paranoid about what they are coming to the city to achieve. As the film unfolds, we learn that the idyllic engagement is not without its complications (Kisrozsi is having an affair with her fiance's arch-rival, the handsome field hand Jancsi, played by Kimmel), and that the town clerk sold out his Jewish best friend when the Germans came to town to try and steal his shop and home.
The film's examination of wartime morals is brisk (this is only 90 minutes long) and the screenplay finds a fine balance between detailed without ever appearing rushed. In the vein of both good writing and plotting, it becomes relatively apparent once we hit the halfway point what the town clerk has done, with him essentially selling his soul to get a few modern trinkets, convincing himself that sacrificing his friend "was inevitable since he would have been taken anyway," but the ending is left open, with you not realizing exactly how will this turn out until the film's final puff of black smoke. After decades of making films about World War II and the Holocaust, you'd think that there wouldn't be much left to say that would be treading new territory about the subject, but 1945 continues the recent trend of discussing the local communities' complicity in Hitler's regime; that, despite being oppressed themselves, they frequently sacrificed their Jewish neighbors in hopes of making lives easier on themselves. 1945 shows that through the various actions of people who have clearly never been comfortable with what they did to the Jewish family whom they turned over to the Nazis, but also showing that they must convince themselves daily that what they did was "inevitable" otherwise they would have to concede that they are walking through the Earth soulless, already damned for eternity. It's a story that at the very least is under-served at cinemas considering the wide breadth of films surrounding this subject.
The movie got some criticism for its score, and the way that it occasionally throws in modernity to the picture, but I kind of liked it. A score that feels reminiscent of Jonny Greenwood's work on There Will Be Blood, it's a clanging, hissing theme that goes along with the aura of the film. No one here is without sin, but in order to repent you have to admit you did something unspeakable, and the score plays with that, interrupting realizations not with a soothing melody but with a cacophonous racket. Like the performances and the writing, it's meant to jangle the viewer, not keep them grounded in what they expect to happen. Overall, it's probably my favorite part of 1945, a film I saw on a lark that nonetheless is one of the better pictures I've encountered in the past year, and certainly the most unexpected.
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