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Mr Orbán stressed that the production of films was in the blood of the Hungarians; they were there upon the release of the first silent movies as well as upon the birth of Hollywood.
In the first half of the last century, Hungarian film-makers set out to conquer the world, while in the second half of the century, it was films that helped us to bear the unbearable, and to speak the unspeakable, said the Prime Minister, adding that he is convinced that films made during communism, too, significantly contributed to the fall of communism.
At the same time, this sweeping momentum came to a halt after the fall of communism, the struggle of “regime changers of our kind” and the “ancien régime” lasted for twenty years, and this did not do Hungarian film any favours, he pointed out.
He added that this could be the case because the state, too, had a responsibility for the state the Hungarian film industry was in at any particular time.
“It’s not about film-making creativity; luckily, the government has no competence at all in that department. Film is not just an industry, but also art, and art is free. Film-makers know that best. However, there is now a need for the state’s assistance with the development of the film industry,” Mr Orbán stressed.
He said due to the flawed film policy of the 2000s, Hungary lost a revenue in the magnitude of USD 200 million, and the Hungarian people, Hungarian film-makers and Hungarian film equally lost out on this. He added that the Hungarian film-making infrastructure – earlier of the highest world standards – had been allowed to go to rack and ruin, and so for a while Hungary had been removed from the filming map of the world, foreign filming crews had chosen other cities instead of Budapest.
At the same time, he stressed, the national government did not want to resign itself to this state of affairs, and found someone in the person of Andy Vajna who understood what made a modern film good and how to make up for the lost expertise. Lauding the efforts of the government commissioner who died in 2019, Mr Orbán stressed that Andy Vajna had created the system of institutions around the National Film Institute which was responsible for the renewal of Hungarian film, “without him we wouldn’t be where we are today.”
Film is art and industry all at once, and Andy Vajna knew that, he added.
Mr Orbán pointed out that thanks to the film industry developments, every year Hungary attracted service production spending in the magnitude of more than a hundred billion forints. He said even the year of the coronavirus pandemic, Hungarian film production generated revenues worth HUF 220 billion, while today the registered spending exceeds HUF 250 billion. He highlighted that today the film industry provided jobs for more than twenty thousand people which was the equivalent of Fót’s total population.
The Prime Minister said the film industry has finally reached the point where films standing on their own two feet are made without state subsidies. “After all, this is what we wanted, that films should belong to everyone,” he said, commenting on the phenomenon.
He pointed out that today world-famous studios were available in Hungary, including the Korda, Origo and Stern Studios, and this made it possible for the country to be the second most sought-after film industry centre in Europe after London. “But of course, we want to overtake the British capital as well,” he added.
Mr Orbán took the view that the Fót development would raise the Hungarian film industry to a new level.
He said in the film industry there are many liberals who “are not exactly friends of the incumbent national government,” but from the national government’s investment “even those film-makers benefit who don’t vote for us.”
He said the project worth HUF 42 billion is the largest state studio development of all time.
The new studios, the great many films made here and the continuously developing experts all show that Hungary has again become an important venue of the world’s film production, the Prime Minister said. He observed that this was owing not only to major international productions, but equally to Hungarian film-makers and Hungarian films which attracted ever more viewers both here at home and abroad.
The Prime Minister said it is to be hoped that this marks the beginning of a new era that we can all be proud of. This studio, too, conveys the message that we Hungarians cannot be content with mediocrity, “we’re not interested in the back row or the gallery seats, we need the grand stage,” Mr Orbán said.
we’re not interested in the back row or the gallery seats, we need the grand stage,
Mr Orbán said.
