THE HUNGARIAN DRESSMAKER

A young Hungarian widow tries to make ends meet as a seamstress in a small Slovakian village on the Hungarian border. Slovakian, German and Hungarian minorities clash increasingly after the German and Austrian conquerors establish a nationalist and racist Slovakian state. Slovakian collaboration begins with the deportation of the Jewish population. Simon, a young Jewish boy, hides with the seamstress. In moving and thoughtful images, the film explores humanity, feelings and responsibility, but also betrayal, collaboration, emotional ambivalence and sexist violence. With its images and human nuances, it is a moving European film that eschews the Holocaust clichés often found in Hollywood.
(Frank Stern)