When they hand you voting cards at a film festival, I never know what to tick. The first film always seems great, it is better than the documentaries you are used to, perhaps it is the first time you have been in a cinema in a while, the atmosphere is contagious.
And then, the second is even better. If I could give Some Birds more than five stars, I would. I am not saying it is better than perfect, although it is great (especially for first time filmmakers), it is that I had already given five stars to another film at this festival, and Some Birds was better than that.
The filmmakers started their journey five years before the festival. Yes, it does take that long to make a movie. The director had an idea from his personal life, and the writer could relate. So, they met at a workshop, and decided to work on it together.
In other words, the story starts with an insider story, writing what you know. But they didn’t end it with their knowledge. They had expert guidance, from experienced filmmakers in an incubator program. And, they even spent a year observing different care homes, asking questions to the director of a care home when they had idea.
The main character is put into a care home by his son. The second main character ends up looking after him, as some kind of juvenile rehabilitation project. Well, the main character does not like it in the care home, and wants to escape, to prove that he can look after himself.
Is that a spoiler? Oh well. Here, the creators did their research, and asked the care home how somoene could be discharged. The scenes in the film are authentic, not only drawing on the creators lives, or the lives of others who are in the homes, but out of questions the creators asked, to see what options the characters would have in real life. They seem to have done more research than the writers of most biopics.
And, I think that is why I like the film. Of course, it helps to have a main character who is charismatic. The actor has had small parts in films before, but is better known as the voice in movies. When his movie-grandson heard the actor’s voice, he said, “you are Rabbit from Winnie the Pooh!” He isn’t really a rabbit, but he is the Hungarian voice of Rabbit.
All of the actors do their parts well, and even before I heard it was anyone’s first time film (it was the writers first, director’s, and the DOP’s first), it was still my favorite film. This film was much more powerful than other films I had seen by seasoned directors. It was more real than documentaries. But it probably won’t win the festival. That usually goes to something political.
I would also recommend Some Birds to learners of Hungarian. There are lots of sections that can be cut out and used as lessons, basic words that A1 or A2 learners should be able to understand. There are also longer sections that are more difficult to follow, and there are a few characters who speak German. But the basic language is interesting, it really fits the lives of the characters, or certain scenes of them anyway, much more naturally than a langauge textbook would.
Yes, I recommend this film. Watch it until the end, and you will see why even the title fits, and why it is called, “Some Birds.”
