Hungarian Film

Taxidermia Gyorgy Palfi's Taxidermia is a difficult film to characterize. It fits into no genre, although it borrows from many. The film is dark and disturbing, while also being so completely over-the-top as to leave the viewer feeling strangely lighthearted and contemplative at the end. Taxidermia could readily be described as a Hungarian form of magical realism: a darker take on the Latin American version.

The film touches upon political and social realities, especially those that impact the filmmaker's country, but does so without becoming didactic and also without specifically mentioning events. Instead, the filmmaker provides the audience with at least some insight into the Hungarian psyche. The first segment of the film focuses on Morosgovanyi Vendel and his desent into madness as he basically works as a slave for the Hungarian military.

This is not the only segment of the film that expressly blurs the lines between dream/fantasy states and what is actually happening in real life. The protagonist at this point sleeps with his Lieutenant's wife, and gets caught. When he does, he also seems to be fornicating with a pig carcass, which provides a symbolic "mother" for Kalman. After all, the Lieutenant's wife becomes pregnant, and her son is named Balatony Kalman. In the ensuing section of Taxidermia, the viewer gets to know Kalman as a champion competitive eater.

It is immediately clear that the pig motif has become the symbolic guiding force in Kalman's life. He trains for eating competitions like an athlete and indeed, perceives himself as an elite athlete. He finds a soul mate who is also a competitive eater and they have a child, Lajoska. Lajoska seems to be the ironic opposite of his father, as he is skinny when his father has become grotesquely obese. As a taxidermist, Lajoska is symbolically linked to his grandfather, who had sexual relations with a pig carcass.

Lajoska's life work is taking dead animals and bringing them to life by preserving them. It is a profession every bit as strange and morbid as competitive eating. Lajoska is surrounded by death, and does not mind its presence. Lajoska must also care for his father, who has become not only belligerent but as insane as his father was too. Kalman starts to keep cats in cages, which in many ways links him to his son and his being surrounded by immobilized animals.

Yet Kalman takes out his self-hatred on his son, and their relationship deteriorates. Whereas Lajoska has a clear vision of who he is, Kalman has given up on life entirely. Soon it becomes clear that the mental and spiritual afflictions will be passed on to Lajoska too. When his father dies, the cats start eating him, and Lajoska takes it upon himself to be their taxidermist. After sewing his father and the cats, he decides to go to work on himself.

He places himself in a harness, self-administers painkillers, and pumps himself full of the chemicals he uses as a taxidermist. The audience is left with the phantasmagoric imagery of a man who mummifies himself. Taxidermia has many layers, and is a fun film to watch. The filmmaker makes a statement in part about the ways memories are.