Hyde Park Pick: Orphan

An appropriate and deeply resonant film for our times, Hungarian filmmaker László Nemes’ new feature Orphan is about how events, largely (or completely) out of our control, can dictate and haunt our lives, often for generations. It’s also very personal for the director, given that what happens to Andor, the orphan of the title, happened to Nemes’ father András and before that, about what happened to his grandparents. And on. And on. 

There’s a long history that has shaped each of us, reaching back into the past, a past that Nemes understands, and with Orphan, brings vividly to life.

Not wanting to speak for the director (or anyone for that matter. How could I? Why would we?) here’s an insightful Guardian interview with Nemes, covering both Orphan and Moulin, (his newest film which had its world premiere at Cannes this week) and discusses the politics of filmmaking and releasing films in the febrile political and cultural environment we find ourselves in.

László Nemes came to prominence with his traumatic but incredibly wonderful and award-winning Son of Saul (2015) and his precise sense of history combined with an attention to period detail are once again present in Orphan, set in the aftermath of the 1956 Hungarian Uprising.

This depth of storytelling creates a host of themes and ways of parsing what is and continues to be our legacy of the most catastrophic period of the 20th Century: World War II, and more specifically in this case, the wholesale and systematic murder of millions of Jews and others in the holocaust.

Ultimately, I think the film is about compromise, resilience and finding ways of surviving, whether it’s through a mother’s love and the choices they need (or are forced) to make for their children, to why an understanding and tolerance of difference BY ALL OF US is so important. Then, and now.

Orphan is showing at HPPH from Fri 22 May. You can book tickets here.