István Szabó: Mephisto / Colonel Redl / Hanussen: Hungary, 1981 - 1988 (UK Import Limited Edition BLU-RAY) Coming to Our Shelves December 16/25

UK Import. Blu-Ray discs are Region Free, should play on any Blu-Ray player.

István Szabó is perhaps the best-known of all Hungarian filmmakers, having made hugely successful, Oscar®-winning films in Hungary, Europe and in Hollywood. This Box Set uncovers the most creative and exuberant period of Szabó’s Hungarian cinema, with a trio of exceptional films made in collaboration with actor Klaus Maria Brandauer, writer Péter Dobai and cinematographer Lajos Koltai: Mephisto (1981), Colonel Redl (1985) and Hanussen (1988). These films unravel the conflicts of history, society, and the individual in a rich and dazzlingly audacious, yet personal manner.

These important and evermore powerfully relevant films are presented from stunning 4K restorations, and released for the first time on Blu-ray in the UK.

This special edition 3-disc Blu-ray box set contains Szabó's most renowned, award-winning, plus four of his acclaimed, rarely seen short works presented from new HD restorations and released for the first time ever on Blu-ray - and more!

Mephisto (1981)
Szabó’s brilliant retelling of the Faust legend centres on a struggling but wildly ambitious actor in 1930s Germany who dispels his political qualms to revel in the adulation he craves. But success, inevitably, comes at a price...
Widely acknowledged as Szabó’s masterpiece, Mephisto is a haunting study in ambition, opportunism, and compromise.

Colonel Redl (Redl ezredes, 1985)
Set in the years before WW1, the film charts the rise and fall of the brilliant but unscrupulous Alfréd Redl, an ambitious young officer who becomes the head of the Austro-Hungarian Secret Police. Klaus Maria Brandauer’s brilliant performance conveys the emotional complexity of a life destroyed by deceit and moral cowardice, as Redl becomes a prisoner of his own deceptions.

Hanussen (1988)
Based on a remarkable true story, Szabó’s third collaboration with Brandauer tracks clairvoyant Hanussen’s rise in parallel with the Nazi regime to dark, mesmerising effect.

Special Features:

• Mephisto (1981), Colonel Redl (1985) and Hanussen (1988) presented from 4K restorations by the National Film Institute Hungary - Film Archive, supervised and approved by cinematographer Lajos Koltai.
  
• Four of István Szabó's acclaimed but rarely seen short film works, newly remastered in HD by the National Film Institute Hungary - Film Archive:
  - Variations on a Theme (Variációk egy témára, 1961)
  - You (Te, 1963)
  - Concert (Koncert, 1963)
  - City Map (Várostérkép, 1977).
  
• István Szabó - The Director Answers: A filmed interview with the award-winning filmmaker.
  
• Remembrance of József Romvári: Filmmaker Sophy Romvari's tribute to her grandfather, the production designer József Romvári, with narration by Szabó.
  
• Szabó’s Central Europe: A look at Szabó's Hungarian films.
  
• Trailers
  
• Individual booklets each with new writing by Hungarian cinema experts John Cunningham, Peter Hames and Catherine Portuges, plus journalist Stephen Lemons on the real-life Erik Jan Hanussen.
  
• Hungarian and German audio options.
  
• New and improved English subtitle translations.
  
• UK premieres on Blu-ray.