Binding Sentiments (1969)
Director: Márta Mészáros Run Time: 98 min. Rating: NR Release Year: 1969 Language: Hungarian
Starring: Ági Mészáros, Gyöngyi Bürös, Kati Kovács, Lajos Balázsovits, Mari Törőcsik
Country: Hungary
Language: Hungarian
Presented at the Film Center as part of The Films of Márta Mészáros, a highlighted retrospective of the feminist screenwriter and director’s filmography, newly restored and on the big screen, from June 10—15, 2022.
About the film:
Family ties become a trap from which a woman struggles to escape in Márta Mészáros’ quietly devastating sophomore feature. Following the sudden death of her prominent politician husband, middle-aged Edit (Mari Töröcsik) finds herself plunged into an existential crisis, caught between her desire for independence and the machinations of her elder son István (Lajos Balázsovits) who seems intent on controlling her life just as his father did. In the middle of it all is István’s young fiancée Kati (Kati Kovács), who gradually realizes that she may be repeating Edit’s mistakes.
Though Binding Sentiments is rare among Mészáros’ works in its focus on a wealthy, rather than working-class, milieu, it strikingly illustrates how the predicaments of patriarchy affect all women.
About the filmmaker:
Márta Mészáros is a socialist and feminist filmmaker whose trailblazing, six-decade career broke barriers in cinema hierarchies, helped legitimize women’s artistic emancipation within the industry, alongside her contemporaries such as Agnès Varda and Věra Chytilová. Read more.
Gateway Film Center is pleased to present a selection of Mészáros’s most essential films.
The Films of Márta Mészáros See our upcoming films