Film Screening: Mephisto (with Istvan Szabo in person) @ National Gallery of Art
February 28, 2008 by Svetlana 
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| March 1, 2008 | ||
| 2:00 pm |
Saturday, March 1, 2008
2:00 PM
Location: National Gallery of Art
Mephisto
(István Szabó, 1981, 35mm, in Hungarian with subtitles, 139 min.)
Szabó masterwork about a self-deceiving, narcissistic artist who rationalizes his moral compromises for the sake of personal success, Mephisto features Klaus Maria Brandauer as the actor who, under protection from a Nazi party member, leaves behind his left-wing theater roots and becomes a celebrated performer in an Aryan production of Goethe’s Faust.
Despite the evident symbolic links between the play and the film, Szabó “happily refuses to overstress the Faustian parallels of the perverse power-pact between the cultural icon and his Goebbels-like puppeteer,” notes Paul Taylor.
István Szabó will introduce the film.
Part of the István Szabó’s 20th Century film series
Event Information
Location: East Building Concourse, Large Auditorium
Admission: Free
Reservations: Not required
