Sipos, István.
Director, screenwriter, director of photography/cameraman, editor.
Born 1943 in Kolozsvár, Hungary (now part of Roumania), the
youngest of four children. He lived with his grandparents in Magyarlapád,
Transylvania until 1950, then spent his early school years going to different Hungarian state-run boarding schools while his mother and sisters remained in Budapest.
The sharp contrast between the freedom he experienced as a child in
the pastoral context of Transylvania and the restrictions of his early school
environment would make an enduring imprint on his filmic reflections on the
human condition.
After achieving brilliantly as a secondary school student he
was admitted to Eötvös Lorand University in Budapest in 1962, where he
majored in Hungarian language and literature, and in education. While an
undergraduate he started shooting newsreels about university life, then
filmed two fiction films, now lost.
In 1965, he entered the Budapest Academy of Dramatic and Cinematic Art, a meritocracy of outstanding Hungarian talent. By the time he graduated from the Academy in 1969 as a director, his school films had competed in Festivals in Hungary, Germany, Italy, and Poland. He had received six national and international festival awards for his work. The most important of these was Line-up (Sorfal), a thirty-minute dramatic short which symbolically portrays how a repressive environment sparks the courage to rebel. It was presented within the context of works by Hungarian film students at Oberhausen in 1968, where it gleaned him an individual Special Prize , in addition to the "Collective Grand Prize".
Between 1970 and 1984 Sipos lived in France, where he was part of the
circle of Costa Gavras and Henri Langlois, founding father of the 7th art and the French Cinemathèque. During his Paris years Sipos made several avant-guard, dramatic, and documentary films as director or as director of photography, including a lyric film about Henri Langlois, the Black and White and Colors (for which he received two national awards).
Shortly after his arrival in Paris he worked on a screenplay with Costa-Gavras, who in an impassioned letter to M. Duhamel, the French Minister of Culture, wrote about his outstanding humanity in addition to his unique talent as a cinematic auteur: …”The French film industry will have reason to celebrate when Sipos makes his first feature under the French banner.”
In 1975 Sipos presented his Hungarian-made cult-film, What are you looking for, Junius? (Mit Keres, Június?) at the International Film Festival in Toulon and won the accolades of Jury President Marguerite Duras.
Working in collaboration with a group of talented, young Parisian actors and visual artists, Sipos founded the SIPOS FILMS G.I.E, produced several short films and wrote numerous feature screenplays, one of which, Flesh of God (Chair de Dieu), was filmed, but is it still not entirely edited for lack of funding. In 1977, after viewing the first part of this film, Black and White and Colors, Henri Langlois declared: "I haven't seen anything comparable since Eisenstein".
Upon returning to Hungary in 1984, Sipos was employed by MAFILM as a director. Between 1984 and 1991, he would write 11 screenplays, all of which
were refused by the Studios of MAFILM for production.
In 1986 he shot Day by Day, a two-part, three-hour film portrait of Miklós Jancsó that describes and analyzes the director's working methods.
In 1987, he finished Iris, a dramatic short, shot in French. The premise behind this film is that freedom's sole imperative is to exist, thus allowing a person to be truly human and to love. The film's protagonist, a man denied freedom, embodies man's struggle to exist fully. The film won Sipos the title of "honorary citizen of the city of Prades" (France) when shown there in competition.
He made filmriports for the French televisions during the Roumanian revolution in Timisora at 1989 and in 1990 he was taking part activly in the change of regime in Hungary.
Since 1992 he has been a founding-member of DUNA Television. As director-redactor of the Artistic Department at DUNA TV, he has written and directed a prolific and complex body of work for television.
F i l m s I n c l u d e:
1965: In the Running (Futtában) First Prize, Highschool festival
Ramp (Rámpa) dir. Károly Bárdos, cam. István Sipos
1966: On the Road (Úton), Backwater (Holtág) films in 16mm.
1966: White Mole (Fehér móló), dir. Alvaro Cabrera, cam. István Sipos
1967: Line-up (Sorfal)
Dr. K.H.G. (Örkény István novella alapján) Alvaro Cabrera and I. Sipos
1967: Holiday Express (Expressz vakáció, color film in 35mm) 3 awards of Tourism filmfestivals
1968: Intervention (Beavatkozás) shot in Europe and Vietnam. Festivals: Krakkow, Pesaro, Mannheim, Benalmadea
1970: What are you looking for, Junius? (Mit Keres, Június?), dramatic doc. in 35mm
Films made in France and Italy between 1970 and 1984
1971: Elsa, dir. Monica Lange-Schmidt, cam: István Sipos
1972: Absence, dir. Gianni Massironi, cam: István Sipos
1973: Henri Langlois, dir./cam. István Sipos
Shopgirl, dir. Gianni Massironi, director of photography: István Sipos
Lesson for Teenagers (doc., Certificate of Merit from the French C.N.C)
1975: The Golden Land (Pays d'Or), 16 mm, unfinished feature shot on the Côte d’Azur
Flesh of God (Chair de Dieu), a 35mm Panavision - unedited feature
1977: Black and White in Color, a short feature. Cert. of Merit from the French C.N.C.)
1979 to 1983: Director of photography for the following films:
Comme querira di droga, 16mm feature shot in New York, (Dir. Gianni Massironi)
Himself, (Sois-meme) shot in Lausanne (Dir. Kovács Endre)
Virginia Woolf, shot in London (dir. Gianni Massironi)
Fairy Tale, a dramatic short shot in Provence, France (dir. Michel Houdayer)
Taxi, a video shot in Budapest (dir. Michel Houdayer)
After his return to Budapest in 1984 Sipos directed:
1986: Day by Day, a three-hour video portrait of Miklós Jancsó (2 x 90-minute parts)
1987: Iris (35mm dramatic short) Sipos got citizenship of honour in France for it.
1992 to Present: as Director with DUNA TV, Literary and Documentary Division
1993: Day of Petőfi, (40min. literary film about the Revolution of 1848)
Steadfastly (34 min. literary film on the life of Vörösmarty Mihály)
The Mission of Bernard Pivot (34 min. documentary shot in Frane)
Series of Eye of sea:
Two days with Angéla Császár
Between Paris and Budapest with Tamás Dunai
19 Minutes with Pál Mácsai
1994: return to the landscapes of his childhood to direct the tetrology
Magyarlapád, (4 x 60min. documentaries about the Transylvanian village of
Queen Gizella, wife of Hungary's King Istvan). Awarded Duna T.V Certificate of Merit.
1995: Eye of sea: In the middle of the world with György Cserhalmi. (29 min. doc)
1996: On the road with László Kunkovács (34 min. doc.)
Guests of Gyöngyi Turzai and Tibor Kónya (34 min. doc)
Nightfall (La nuit est venu) a feature documentary on "1956" (dir. William Guerin, dir. of photographie: Istvan Sipos)
71 min., a co-production with ARTE, France)
1997: Eye of sea: The World of István Bubik (45 min. lyric film about an actor)
Two feature documentaries on the life of Olympic Champion Dezsö Gyarmati:
Golden Age (64 min.) and The Birth of Democracy (57 min.)
1998: Two film portraits of actor Gábor Miklós:
Last Interview (45 min.) and Farewell Hamlet (47 min.);
Spirit of Bethlen (62 min. doc. filmed in Translyvania)
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me (52 min. doc.)
Hungary through the eyes of a French Photojournalist (55min.)
1999: as director/camerman:
A Letter from Tarkovszki (a dramatic short starring long-time collaborator
Patrick Loterman).
The year 2000:
Portrait of Mr. Gábor Both
The Duna Grand Ball (doc.)
Manna Rax by Mr. Lehel Rácz (doc.)
Reflections on the description of workers (30 min. doc.)
2001:
Inspiration, revolt, preservation, creation… (Island: 60 min. cultural emission)
Jazz-mirror (Island, cultural emission: 60 min.)
Star-world (Island, cultural emission: 60 min.)
Talentum: Confidental conversation with Mr. Ferenc Glatz
Talentum: Master and his disciple (30 min. documentary)
Earth Unattainable (Island: 50 min. cultural emission)
Eye of sea: Pap Vera, as the Stars are going on the Sky (60 min. doc.)
Candel lighting (Christmas Broadcast, dec. 2001, 56 min.)
2002
Eye of the sea:
Six Film Potraits featuring Hungary’s leading actors. This series was funded through the ORTT Competition
Varga Zoltán in golden section (30 min. musical-literary film)
Sándor Tóth, „Towadrs Fulfilment” (56 min.)
Human voice (a biographical portrait of of Peter Haumann, 57 min.)
Plato and Haumann (a short fiction, 28 min.)
The life-tales of Ilona Bencze (41 min.)
The Kern… (feature potrait on the life of András Kern, 94 min.)
Novotel (advertising spot, 45”)
2003
In the workshop of Karoly Vilheim (doc, 15’)
In the workshop of János Aknay (doc, 29’)
FranciArt (doc, 26’)
TROCOLOR (doc, 70’)
In the workshop of Robert König (doc, 18’)
Maecenas (doc, 40’)
In the workshop of Balazs Kicsiny (doc, 16’)
Talentum: Pitti Katalin (doc, 30’)
In the workshop of Liviusz Gyulai (doc, 16’)
In the workshop of Mihály Schéner (doc. 27’)
2004
„Miroirs de memoire” “Mirrors of memory” -
Dans l’atelier d’Endre Kovács (doc. 27’)
UNIVERSITAS (doc. 68’)
„Paragraphs” Sándor Csoóri, Béla Bacsó, Ferenc András, Zorán Sztevanovity, Ilona Bencze, Ildikó Piros
Play of colours In the work-shop of Sándor Hartung (doc, 31’)
Talentum: László Hefter Showing his true colours (doc, 26’)
Ideal (doc, 30)
2005
Image-creation In the work-shop of Gabor Karátson (doc. 21’)
The world of Sándor Csoóri Premier plan from pure spring (doc’ 56’)
Talentum Karoly Eperjes (doc. 26’)
Not enough world (doc. 51’) Il n’y pas assez de monde
Enchantement (138 miniaturs with Andrea Kalocsai and 119 miniaturs with Cecilia Esztergályos)
Return Home Edina Koszmovszky (doc. 54’)
Talentum Jordán Tamás (doc. 26’)
2006
Not enough world (doc. 53’)
Sky sundered in two (doc. 53’)
Hand-mark: Andor Lukáts (doc. 30’)
2007
Gift of fair (doc. 17’)
2008
Aron in Germany (doc, 90’)
Hand-mark: András Bálint (doc. 41’)
2009
The heavenly and the earthly (doc. 60')
2010
Elle est retrouvée (fiction, Paris)
About Some Films:
Entrapment (Haie, 35mm, shot in Hungary, 1967)
Writer/Director: István Sipos Head of photography: Péter Jankura Producer: István Lakatos
Running time: 30 min.
Entrapment, a dramatic short, symbolically portrays the combative force that
a lack of freedom can engender.
In a state-run boarding-school for boys, continual oppression and punishment
erode the students' egos, and ultimately lead them to commit murder. Samson
and Korsos, two friends with opposite personalities, both try to change the
order of things. Samson tells the boys stories filled with dreams and poetry
late into the night to counter the harsh realities of daily school life.
Samson, who abhors violence, escapes from school only to be brought back by
Korsos. A pillow fight in the dormitory is interrupted by one of the teaching
staff who has an "informer" among the students. The boys are blind-folded
and ordered to blindly fight each other, but Samson and Korsos refuse. They
are manipulated by their teacher to the point of feeling that each betrayed
the other. The other boys who witness this are troubled, and become conscious of
what it means to be oppressed. The next morning the boys refuse to drink
their coffee. The teacher has invited the school's board of directors to this
breakfast and he reads aloud a letter written by Samson and Korsos, protesting the intolerable conditions at the school. (The "informer" had turned the letter over to the teacher.) The teacher threatens to send Samson and Korsos to reform school, if they don't call off the hunger strike. The other boys submit and drink their coffee. Then, with the exeption of Samson, the boys attack the "informer", who accidentally dies. Samson, unable to accept this, immediatly escapes. Korsos runs after him, screaming: Stop! Come back! Now everything is going to change!” It’s too late. Samson runs into the endless waters of the Balaton. Afterwards, the boys somberly assume responsibility for their deed, thus making their rite of passage into manhood.
Iris (Írisz). 35mm. 1989
Written and Directed by István Sipos
Camera: Sasvári Lajos
Starring: Patrick Loterman
Produced by Béla Balázs Stúdió, Budapest
Running time: 15 min.
The concept behind the film Iris (Írisz) is that freedom's sole imperative is
to exist, thus allowing a person to be truly human and to love. This is embodied
in the film's protagonist, a man denied freedom. The protagonist, played by long-time artistically, actor Patrick Loterman, lives joylessly yet nobly through his good deeds which he carries out in the absence of love. With each obstacle he is faced with a struggle: to die or to be fully alive. Freedom becomes inextricably linked to the protagonist's awareness of his humanness. Humanness and freedom become united in his consciousness. In the absence of a human being, freedom will create him, but
without freedom, community can allow freedom to be reborn.
Tel.: : DUNA TV (361) 489 15 32 Tel. portable: 06 – 30 580 51 29
E-mail: Sipos_I@dunatv.hu
Address: 1085 - Budapest, Horánszky u 9.
