My feature long experimental contemplative film "Under The Burning Sun" was shot on July 21st 2020, on Bela Tarr's 65th birthday. Nothing was prepared advance as usual, neither what's going to happen in my film after I press the "rec" button, nor had any idea the Maestro had his jubilee on this day. It's not a question this is Synchronicity and not a coincidence. I'm experiencing synchronicity almost on daily basis for years. I don't want to get into details, maybe another time. As usually in my films, neither the shooting day nor the filming location was chosen advance. Everything was spontaneous.
Most of my films contains only static shot and one long take. The lengths of takes are vary. This film is slightly different. I shot two takes instead of the usual one, because I felt the magic is happening. It was sometime after 11am. The sunrays were almost vertical. There was not even one tree at all, to give shade and of course I left my umbrella and the sunblock in the car. I guess you all can imagine the consequences.
Post-production was a real challenge to figure it out, where should I cut the story without causing aesthetic damage. The story was built by the life itself. My main "directorial responsibility" at the location (besides the chosen visual background of the scene) is usually to make decision, when to start and stop rolling. There is usually an opening scene and a closing scene where's nothing particular happening but basically there are things require the viewer's eye and ear to do more work.
The observation is an important part of the process. There's neither mise-en-scène nor directorial instructions. Only a very pure form of the sense and sensibility, harmony between the elements, a kind of Zen.
In my films I don't use subtitle because the visual has the priority over the dialogue. It doesn't mean for example in this case the fishers dialogues are not important but not from my point of view.
Ok, that's all in a nutshell. So the next day of the shoot, on July 22nd, I read about Bela Tarr 's birthday on social media and decided to dedicate this film to him as an homage. I'm not sure he'll ever watch this film, that was not the reason I made it.
Boldog születésnapot!
"If you look for a meaning, you'll miss everything that happens."
Andrei Tarkovsky
The story:
West Baray (The Great Reservoir) (dating back to the XI. Century) in Siem Reap, Cambodia is beneficial for people make a living from fishing, though this year the Almighty God is not so gracious to them. Fishermen and their households are among the poorest, marginalized and vulnerable people in the Khmer society.
...for a limited time the film is available on my vimeo channel
here. ...information for distribution or screening please send me a PM!
