HUNGARY: Helen Mirren joins Hungarian director Istvan Szabo in Budapest for the premiere of their film, 'The Door'

Record ID: 813609

  • Title: HUNGARY: Helen Mirren joins Hungarian director Istvan Szabo in Budapest for the premiere of their film, 'The Door'
  • Date: 8th March 2012
  • Summary: BUDAPEST, HUNGARY (MARCH 7, 2012) (REUTERS) MIRREN WALKING ONTO STAGE AT END OF SCREENING VARIOUS OF AUDIENCE CLAPPING MIRREN KISSING SZABO AND BOWING
  • Embargoed: 23rd March 2012 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Hungary, Hungary
  • Country: Hungary
  • Reuters ID: LVA96UTG5HSJENX8LAJ9S0954WYT
  • Story Text: British actress Helen Mirren on Thursday evening (March 8) brought a touch of glamour to the Budapest premiere of 'The Door' where she braved the cold to greet fans ahead of the film's screening.
    'The Door' is the latest film from Academy Award winning Hungarian director Istvan Szabo, portraying an evolving relationship between two women, a writer played by German actress Martina Gedeck and Mirren's character, an elderly housekeeper.
    Sixty-six year-old Mirren, who won an Academy Award for Best Actress in 2007 for her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth, said her costume played a key role in forming her character and also struck deep cords with her own eastern European background.
    "I put it on with the hat, with the head piece and I was amazed, I was amazed. I looked like an eastern European, I looked like an eastern European! It was incredible, I had no make-up on and I was, I couldn't.., I looked at myself and I recognised myself in some deep fundamental way, because I am half Russian," she said.
    The film is based on an autobiographical novel of Magda Szabo and set under the Communist era. It portrays two tough women who each live by their own strict rules.
    Mirren plays the stubborn, secretive housekeeper, Emerence, prone to odd behaviours.
    But gradually her passion to help and ability to love are revealed and the two women get close to each other and learn to respect and love each other, - a symbolic door opens between them.
    Mirren said the film was also about the everyday struggles of people in Eastern Europe as well as the European wartime generations of the 20th century.
    "For me the deep meaning of the film somehow is somehow buried in my parents' history, my grandparents' history, the history of Europe... the suffering and the courage and the nobility of that generation, of those generations, [translator speaking] that sadly we are in the process of losing now that generation. [translator speaking] For me to appear in this film was a way of honouring that generation."
    Oscar winning film director Istvan Szabo said that the films central theme was the struggle of trust and the dilemma of people interfering in each others' lives.
    "In essence, during our whole life we have experienced that various ideologies have tried to interfere in our lives, even in our private lives, people tried to force their views, their ideologies onto others. And whether one can interfere in the life of another is a fundamentally important topic," he said.
    Szabo, himself has been through the scandal mill, after it was revealed in 2006 that he had worked as an informant for Hungary's communist-era secret police while a film student in the 1950s. Szabo was named in a weekly as someone who had spied on his fellow Hungarians for the communist authorities. Szabo admitted it but said his reports did not damage people. The Hungarian film world gave him support.
    The Door is the first film Szabo has made since the revelations.
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