COLOGNE, Germany -- Manfred Durniok, the Oscar-winning producer of Hungarian director Istvan Szabo's Mephisto as well of dozens of European and Asian art house features, died Friday in Berlin. He was 68. Durniok's Berlin-based production company, Manfred Durniok Produktion fuer Film und Fernsehen, confirmed Tuesday that the producer died of a heart attack.
- 3/12/2003
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Nine diverse characters brace for imminent Japanese attack in Durniok's 'Hotel Shanghai'
It's in the grand old "Grand Hotel" tradition and style, this epic entertainment from German producer Manfred Durniok, who is best known in the United States as the producer of the foreign-language Oscar winner "Mephisto".
Based on the book by Vicki Baum, "Hotel Shanghai" is a grand-scale entertainment set against the cataclysm of an impending war and peopled by a vast array of colorful international travelers. Admittedly, it's a bit old-fashioned in form and structure, but it's a decidedly juicy and intelligent evocation of a disjointed time and a dangerous place.
Edited into two forms -- Trident will release a 101-minute version in the States, while German TV will play a two-part, 178-minute miniseries -- "Hotel Shanghai" is an intriguing pastiche of one of China's most rough-and-tumble cities, certainly a locale not familiar to the eyes of Westerners. It was filmed entirely in Shanghai and, as such, takes us to heretofore forbidden film terrain. A co-production of Durniok, MDR German TV and Oriental Communications with the assistance of the Shanghai Film Studio, this production is perhaps most noteworthy for the international partnerships that producer Durniok has forged. In a most unusual coup, Durniok was allowed to do postproduction in his native land rather than in China, a wish not usually granted to foreign film producers.
Set in 1937, "Hotel Shanghai" is a billowing mixture of intrigue, passion, duplicity and heroism. It's set on the precipice of war: The Japanese attack is imminent, and the city is bracing for a bloody invasion.
In this sharp but sprawling pastiche, screenwriter Angel Wagenstein has sagely distilled Baum's novel to understandable, filmic dimension, focusing on nine diverse characters whose lives and fates are inextricably bound by the charged conditions of the imminent invasion. It's a lively mix of the super-rich and the world weary.
The performances are distinguished and nicely fleshed. In particular, Agnieszka Wagner ("Schindler's List") is radiantly strong-willed as a young woman caught up in a sticky love triangle, while Elliott Gould, as a seen-it-all vagabond, brings a welcomely jaded sensibility to the goings-on. Unfortunately, the dialogue is often thick and perfunctory.
Director Peter Patzak has fashioned a roiling entertainment, nicely transposing this sprawling story to a tight, filmic dimension. Technically, it's marvelous with its teeming visuals and captivating marches through old Shanghai. Highest praise to cinematographer Martin Stingl for the panoramic scopings, and particular praise to art director Qin Baisong for evoking the passions and terrors of the times.
HOTEL SHANGHAI
Trident Releasing
A Manfred Durniok film
Credits: Producer: Manfred Durniok; Director: Peter Patzak; Screenwriter: Angel Wagenstein; Based on the book by: Vicki Baum; Director of photography: Martin Stingl; Editors: Sylvia Hebel, Roberto Silvi; Music: Christian Bruhn; Art director: Qin Baisong. Cast: Madame Tissaud: Annie Giradot; Frank Taylor: James McCaffrey; Hutchinson: Elliott Gould; Helen Russell: Agnieszka Wagner; Bobbie Russell: Nicholas Clay; Sir Kingsdale-Smith: Patrick Ryecart; Kurt Planke: Robert Giggenbach; Ruth Anderson: Micah Taylor West; Pearl Chang: Min Zhang. Color; Running time: 101 minutes; no MPAA rating.
It's in the grand old "Grand Hotel" tradition and style, this epic entertainment from German producer Manfred Durniok, who is best known in the United States as the producer of the foreign-language Oscar winner "Mephisto".
Based on the book by Vicki Baum, "Hotel Shanghai" is a grand-scale entertainment set against the cataclysm of an impending war and peopled by a vast array of colorful international travelers. Admittedly, it's a bit old-fashioned in form and structure, but it's a decidedly juicy and intelligent evocation of a disjointed time and a dangerous place.
Edited into two forms -- Trident will release a 101-minute version in the States, while German TV will play a two-part, 178-minute miniseries -- "Hotel Shanghai" is an intriguing pastiche of one of China's most rough-and-tumble cities, certainly a locale not familiar to the eyes of Westerners. It was filmed entirely in Shanghai and, as such, takes us to heretofore forbidden film terrain. A co-production of Durniok, MDR German TV and Oriental Communications with the assistance of the Shanghai Film Studio, this production is perhaps most noteworthy for the international partnerships that producer Durniok has forged. In a most unusual coup, Durniok was allowed to do postproduction in his native land rather than in China, a wish not usually granted to foreign film producers.
Set in 1937, "Hotel Shanghai" is a billowing mixture of intrigue, passion, duplicity and heroism. It's set on the precipice of war: The Japanese attack is imminent, and the city is bracing for a bloody invasion.
In this sharp but sprawling pastiche, screenwriter Angel Wagenstein has sagely distilled Baum's novel to understandable, filmic dimension, focusing on nine diverse characters whose lives and fates are inextricably bound by the charged conditions of the imminent invasion. It's a lively mix of the super-rich and the world weary.
The performances are distinguished and nicely fleshed. In particular, Agnieszka Wagner ("Schindler's List") is radiantly strong-willed as a young woman caught up in a sticky love triangle, while Elliott Gould, as a seen-it-all vagabond, brings a welcomely jaded sensibility to the goings-on. Unfortunately, the dialogue is often thick and perfunctory.
Director Peter Patzak has fashioned a roiling entertainment, nicely transposing this sprawling story to a tight, filmic dimension. Technically, it's marvelous with its teeming visuals and captivating marches through old Shanghai. Highest praise to cinematographer Martin Stingl for the panoramic scopings, and particular praise to art director Qin Baisong for evoking the passions and terrors of the times.
HOTEL SHANGHAI
Trident Releasing
A Manfred Durniok film
Credits: Producer: Manfred Durniok; Director: Peter Patzak; Screenwriter: Angel Wagenstein; Based on the book by: Vicki Baum; Director of photography: Martin Stingl; Editors: Sylvia Hebel, Roberto Silvi; Music: Christian Bruhn; Art director: Qin Baisong. Cast: Madame Tissaud: Annie Giradot; Frank Taylor: James McCaffrey; Hutchinson: Elliott Gould; Helen Russell: Agnieszka Wagner; Bobbie Russell: Nicholas Clay; Sir Kingsdale-Smith: Patrick Ryecart; Kurt Planke: Robert Giggenbach; Ruth Anderson: Micah Taylor West; Pearl Chang: Min Zhang. Color; Running time: 101 minutes; no MPAA rating.
- 10/7/1997
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
BERLIN -- "Sweet Emma, Dear Boebe'' (Edes Emma, Draga Boebe), Istvan Szabo's low-budget Hungarian entry at the Berlinale, cost less than $500,000 to make. A David Puttnam disciple, the director of "Meeting Venus'' set out to prove that quality productions in Europe can be made for a fraction of what they cost in the American studio system.
The story of two underpaid schoolteachers from the provinces, Emma (played by Dutch actress Johanna ter Steege) and Boebe (Erniko Borcsok), "Sweet Emma'' chronicles with chapter-heading intertitles their lives and hard times in a Budapest that is shifting dramatically from a Communist past to a capitalist present and still unforeseeable future.
The plus side of this intriguing film chronicle is how Szabo mercilessly takes the pulse of Hungarian society today. Indeed, the picture he presents is dark and pessimistic -- the schoolteachers are barely paid a living wage while forced to share a room in a state-run hostel on the edge of the city.
The minus side is Szabo's reluctance to dig below the surface of the tale and offer something more than just what the boulevard press has been reporting nearly every day in Budapest. Outside of the extraordinary performance given by ter Steege as Emma, there's not much else to chew on psychologically.
Since Emma and Boebe were trained to be Russian teachers, they now have to learn smatterings of English at night school to stumble through their own classes on the same in a crowded classroom the next morning. At the same time, Emma longs for sexual fulfillment in a demeaning relationship with her school principal, a pain that's doubled by having an aged mother lying ill in a hospital bed.
As for Boebe, she's seduced into joining a private bordello that's run by "foreigner investors'' in the city. When she's arrested by the police and the truth comes out, she's fired from her job at the school and thrown out of the hostel.
She commits suicide -- and Emma's nerves then crack. She ends up losing her job, too, and is reduced to selling newspapers at the railway station to make a living.
Winner of the Special Jury prize at the Berlinale, "Sweet Emma, Dear Boebe'' scores as a compelling, uncompromising drama of life and times in Budapest today, as seen through the eyes of two struggling young teachers from the provinces. It's Szabo's best film since his Oscar-winning "Mephiso'' a decade ago.
SWEET EMMA, DEAR BOEBE
(EDES EMMA, DRAGA BOEBE)
(Hungarian-German)
Objektiv Film Studio (Budapest), in co-production with Manfred Durniok Produktion
fuer Film und Fernsehen (Berlin)
Producer Manfred Durniok
Director-screenwriter Istvan Szabo
Director of photography Lajos Koltai
Art director Attila Kovacs
Editor Eszter Kovacs
Music Tibor Bornai, Mihaly Moricz, Ferenc Nagy, Beatrice, Robert Schumann
Color
Cast:
Emma Johanna ter Steege
Boebe Erniko Borczok
Stefanics Peter Andorai
Sleepy Eva Kerekes
Running time -- 90 minutes
No MPAA rating
(c) The Hollywood Reporter...
The story of two underpaid schoolteachers from the provinces, Emma (played by Dutch actress Johanna ter Steege) and Boebe (Erniko Borcsok), "Sweet Emma'' chronicles with chapter-heading intertitles their lives and hard times in a Budapest that is shifting dramatically from a Communist past to a capitalist present and still unforeseeable future.
The plus side of this intriguing film chronicle is how Szabo mercilessly takes the pulse of Hungarian society today. Indeed, the picture he presents is dark and pessimistic -- the schoolteachers are barely paid a living wage while forced to share a room in a state-run hostel on the edge of the city.
The minus side is Szabo's reluctance to dig below the surface of the tale and offer something more than just what the boulevard press has been reporting nearly every day in Budapest. Outside of the extraordinary performance given by ter Steege as Emma, there's not much else to chew on psychologically.
Since Emma and Boebe were trained to be Russian teachers, they now have to learn smatterings of English at night school to stumble through their own classes on the same in a crowded classroom the next morning. At the same time, Emma longs for sexual fulfillment in a demeaning relationship with her school principal, a pain that's doubled by having an aged mother lying ill in a hospital bed.
As for Boebe, she's seduced into joining a private bordello that's run by "foreigner investors'' in the city. When she's arrested by the police and the truth comes out, she's fired from her job at the school and thrown out of the hostel.
She commits suicide -- and Emma's nerves then crack. She ends up losing her job, too, and is reduced to selling newspapers at the railway station to make a living.
Winner of the Special Jury prize at the Berlinale, "Sweet Emma, Dear Boebe'' scores as a compelling, uncompromising drama of life and times in Budapest today, as seen through the eyes of two struggling young teachers from the provinces. It's Szabo's best film since his Oscar-winning "Mephiso'' a decade ago.
SWEET EMMA, DEAR BOEBE
(EDES EMMA, DRAGA BOEBE)
(Hungarian-German)
Objektiv Film Studio (Budapest), in co-production with Manfred Durniok Produktion
fuer Film und Fernsehen (Berlin)
Producer Manfred Durniok
Director-screenwriter Istvan Szabo
Director of photography Lajos Koltai
Art director Attila Kovacs
Editor Eszter Kovacs
Music Tibor Bornai, Mihaly Moricz, Ferenc Nagy, Beatrice, Robert Schumann
Color
Cast:
Emma Johanna ter Steege
Boebe Erniko Borczok
Stefanics Peter Andorai
Sleepy Eva Kerekes
Running time -- 90 minutes
No MPAA rating
(c) The Hollywood Reporter...
- 2/25/1992
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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