Diary for My Father and Mother

The final piece of Mészáros’s epic Diary series finds our heroes, Juli and Janos, in the aftermath of the 1956 Hungarian Uprising, witnessing political repression and a Russian propaganda machine that turns revolutionaries into “fascists” and Soviet aggression into Hungarian. (“Are Moscow newspapers lying?” Juli’s Russian friends ask incredulously.) Mészáros weaves historical documentary materials into the fictional narrative, crystallizing an entire nation’s struggle into one family’s journey. “As such, it serves to commemorate and remember those who had, and continue to have, the courage to speak the truth in the face of certain death, punishment and deprivation” (Catherine Portuges, Screen Memories).