Béla Tarr
Hungary,
1981
Expanding The Family Nest’s investigations of domestic dysfunction and despair, The Outsider marks Béla Tarr’s maturation as a chronicler of the manifold ways that social pressure deforms individual aspirations. András Szabó plays András, a violinist whose talent is undermined by unwise decisions and unwanted responsibilities. Continually drinking and squandering income, he alienates his long-lost brother, Csotesz (Imre Donkó), and new wife, Kata (Jolán Fodor), all while grinding away at a tedious factory job to support his illegitimate child. Once again collaborating with amateur actors and capturing the intense interactions between characters via handheld close-ups, Tarr paints a critical and unsentimental portrait of Hungary’s forgotten, disenfranchised working class in the first of only two films that the director shot in color.