The Hungarian film director is known for his existentially daunting black and white films. He explains why he left his home country to run his own film school, and why he loves Chekhov, Hitchcock – and Gus Van Sant
For years, Béla Tarr’s daunting films were unavailable in the UK and he was the much-discussed fugitive genius of high European cinema, the Col Kurtz of the movies, hidden deep in the jungle of ideas.
But in the 80s and 90s the work of the Hungarian auteur began to be shown in Britain and connoisseur audiences were stunned or puzzled or electrified by his extremely long movies. Often adapted from the equally revered and difficult novels of Hungarian modernist László Krasznahorkai, these films were edited and latterly co-directed by his wife Ágnes Hranitzky and featured the music of Mihály Vig.
