Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7001 in DVD
• Released on: 2006-11-13
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
• Formats: Box set, Black & White, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: Hungarian
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 3
• Running time: 419 minutes

Synopsis
A small backwater village is the setting for this colossal Hungarian saga. Clocking in at seven hours, Bela Tarr’s film details the plight of the village folk as they prepare to leave. Believing that there are monies owed to them, the villagers wait for a payout, but some of their number and conspiring to leave with more than their fair share. Into this chaotic equation comes Irimiás, a man thought to be dead and one that will be instrumental in trying to keep their community together.

Customer Reviews

Beyond cinema
I'm not going to bore you with the details of the `story' because first of all nothing really happens and secondly it's not important. Mostly its just people looking in and out of windows, walking, or just being, yet that may be what we're doing also by sitting for 7 hours, watching other people by transcending the barrier of celluloid and sharing in their misery. They say the eyes are the windows of the soul and in these Breughelian faces we see the personality of characters shine through and understand their individual and personal agony. This is what elevates this film beyond cinema and art into something more personal like the experience of music. By the end of the film characters feel like real people that we may intimately know.

Parallels are inevitably drawn with the work other directors like Tarkovsky, most notably `Andrei Rublev' (1966) and `Stalker' (1979). Tarkovsky's films had a sense of religious hope whereas Bela Tarr's have none of that yet I felt a certain amount of elation at the end. Albert Camus said that struggling to the height may be enough to fill a man's heart. How true.

This is a film I've waited several years to see since I first saw `Werkmeister Harmonies' (2000) and `Damnation' (1988) on the Artificial Eye DVD release. Rumour circulated for a long time about this eventual release and finally we have it. It's a film more have heard about than actually seen and has always been highly revered among cineastes. Satantango is filled with some of the most remarkable cinematography I've ever seen. So was it worth the wait? Absolutely.

Bela Tarr may be the greatest living director working today.

Highly recommended viewing.

Mud, Rain & Alcohol
A collective farm in disarray. A messianic agitator. And lots of mud & rain. Yes, it's the infamous 7 hour movie, all in Bela Tarr's trademark style: arty black & white cinematography, long slow takes, tracking shots & zooms. The style recalls Tarkovsky but the sensibility is completely different - relentlessly downbeat, squalid & cynical, a bit like Aki Kaurismaki without the jokes. So you get a doctor drinking himself to death, a cat being tortured & a suicidal little girl taking rat poison - all depicted in slow real time takes. It's uncomfortable viewing not because it's boring but because it gets almost too intense.
This is definitely film making of the highest order with stunning images & a very clever interlocking narrative structure, but I found Satantango harder going than his earlier film Damnation. That film had a more focused setting, plot & characterisation whereas Satantango is rather weighed down with enigmatic surrealism & allegorical overtones. I hesitate to recommend Satantango - various criticisms could be levelled at the film & it is certainly not for the uninitiated, but if you know Bela Tarr's work (particularly if you enjoyed Werckmeister Harmonies) or have an interest in good old European art house cinema then you should get this DVD - it's a unique film for sure.
(Nice to see some of the other Amazon reviews here are complaining that the film is too short!)

I was like totaly awesome dude
I once went on a search for the longest film ever released and i stumbled upon this. At 7.5hours long it fitted the bill it's also black and white and in Hungarian.

So i bought it purely because it was 7.5hrs long, b&w and Hungarian. I just wanted to see if i could, i had no idea what the film was going to be like.

Once it arrived i waited until the mood was right to sit/lay down and watch as much as i could in one sitting. I was half expecting it to be some philosophical arty bull**** of a film, however, the film just sucked me in from the moment it started.

The imagery, characters and long shots are unlike anything else i've seen on film before. In short the film is stunning, it's not complicated, difficult to follow or arty farty film art house stuff. I watch at least once year during the winter when i have a cold or cant be bothered to get out of bed.

I'm proud to have this in my collection, It's a film that Hollywood cannot touch, it can never be remade into a 1.5hr abortion starring Nicolas Cage or some other so called 'actor'.

Satantango is one film that truly deserves the hype.
The funny thing is the dvd cover isn't plastered with "masterpiece" or "stunning" or other choice picked words from reviews that you've never read. Just as the Bible isn't plastered with "great read" or "epic life changing stories" or "based on a true events" all over it's cover nor should this be.

If you've read it this far then thanks for reading.