Sunshine is a long historical drama that depicts Hungarian history from the times of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the 19th century until the Hungarian Revolution in 1956, by following five generations of a Jewish family.
The attractiveness of this movie is that it depicts Hungarian history in an understandable way. The man of the first generation of the family is the owner of a pub in a rural village during the Austro-Hungarian Dual Monarchy. After he dies young, his eldest son (second generation) goes to Budapest for work in a factory, and greatly succeeds as the owner of a distillery that makes medicinal alcohol using a family recipe. His son (third generation) becomes a jurist, changes his Jewish surname to a surname that sounds Hungarian, and becomes a loyal judge for the emperor. However, when the Hungarian Soviet Republic is formed after Hungary is defeated in World War I, the man of the third generation lives under house arrest as a war criminal and he dies in despair.
The Hungarian Soviet Republic was overthrown by an intervention by Romania, and the imperial rule was restored; but due to both World War I and the Party of Communists in Hungary being overthrown by Romania, Hungary lost most of its territory, and bitterness turned them toward the Nazi regime. In order to recover lost territory, Hungary joined the Axis powers during World War II; however, by 1944, Hungary wanted to withdraw from the Axis, but this was prevented by the Nazi Germany army. The man of the fourth generation becomes a national champion in fencing and a gold medalist at the Berlin Olympics. In order to qualify to participate in the 1936 Berlin Olympics, he converts to Catholicism. However, in the end, he is sent to a concentration camp and is murdered.
The man of the fifth generation, having barely escaped alive from the concentration camp, participates in the secret police of the Hungarian People’s Republic that is established with the support of the Soviet Union, and starts arresting those that supported the Nazis. However, his job gradually changes to arresting patriots of anti-Stalin groups. With the outbreak of the Hungarian Revolution in 1956, he is arrested and imprisoned for giving a public speech in support of the army that opposed the Soviet Union. When he is released and returns home, he is the only survivor of his family. He changes his surname back to his original Jewish surname, and swears to live as a Jew.
Another interesting thing about this movie is the reason why these Hungarian Jews stayed in Hungary without escaping, even though they noticed the anti-Semitism of the Nazis steadily descending on them. Anti-Semitism started with legal reform that partially oppressed the privileges of prosperous and high-class Jews, but the laws did not apply to the families of soldiers that fought for the emperor in World War I. Also, those who contributed to the promotion of national prestige, such as an Olympic medalist, were exceptions. In other words, these anti-Semitic laws did not initially apply to this family. In such a situation, there was no reason one had to throw away all of their assets and run away to a foreign country where they didn’t speak the language. However, in the end, all the Jews were sent to concentration camps, although this movie doesn’t explain why.
Although this movie had a lot of work put into it and it depicts a majestic theme, I feel like this movie will not be regarded as a masterpiece or even a great movie. I want to discuss why I believe this movie was not a masterpiece.
The first reason is the way the third, fourth, and fifth generation protagonists (all three of them were played by the British actor Ralph Fiennes) are depicted. These three aim for power and have a strong desire to move up, and they go through great efforts—changing their surname and religion—in order to get it. However, these men don’t hold much love for women. When aggressively approached by women, the men say, “No, I can’t,” but then eventually give in to their lust and have relations; they later coldly blame the women for seducing them, saying, “Because of you, my life was destroyed.” The relationships that develop with these women—the woman who was brought up as his little sister (third generation), the wife of his older brother (fourth generation), and the wife of his cold-blooded Stalinist boss (fifth generation)—all carry the dangerous scent of immorality. In real life, women like men who are talented yet don’t cling to power, and who are able to devote themselves to a woman deeply and unwaveringly. Because the protagonists in this movie are the complete opposite of this, dabbling in immoral behavior and only interested in sexual relations—a very unappealing character to most women—it is no wonder that a woman watching this movie is rubbed the wrong way. It is disastrous if a movie loses support from women since half of the audience for a movie is women.
The unsympathetic portrayal of these characters is quite dangerous for a movie that depicts the heavy theme of the Holocaust. In the worst case, it may raise the very dangerous argument of, “I see, let’s accept the fact that the Holocaust really happened. But aren’t Jews also responsible for what happened?” Of course nobody can be a perfect saint without any flaws. However, I think some caution is required when depicting such a heavy theme.
István Szabó, the writer and director of this movie, also directed Mephisto—which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film—and he represents Hungary as a filmmaker. In 2006, it was broadcasted that he wrote information about his fellow directors and actors as a spy after the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. He at first denied this; in the end, though, he admitted that it was true, but it is said that many people came to his support. After the Hungarian Revolution, people were under extreme political oppression, and it certainly wasn’t easy to survive in Hungary, which had become a police state. Those were cruel times.
Another problem in this movie is that since it is a long historical drama that follows this family over five generations in 3 hours, the depiction of each individual is superficial, and I get the feeling of events one after another being patched together. However, the models that the characters are based off of are very interesting.
Hungary was very strong in fencing, and there are in fact Jews among the gold medalists. Attila Petschauer was on the fencing team that won gold in the team competition in the 1928 Amsterdam Olympics and the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics. Endre Kabos was also on the winning fencing team in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics, as well as got a gold medal in both the individual and team competitions in fencing in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. These two also were sent to Nazi concentration camps and died. The man of the fourth generation in this movie seems to be based on both Endre Kabos, having won the individual competition at the Berlin Olympics, and Attila Petschauer, with the very cruel method depicted of being executed at the concentration camp by a fellow Hungarian.
Also, the boss of the man of the fifth generation seems to be modeled off of a real man named László Rajk. As a Jewish communist, he miraculously returned alive from Auschwitz and made every possible effort to revive his home country Hungary, but was hated by Stalin followers and was executed in 1949. Afterwards, his honor was momentarily restored during the Hungarian Revolution, but Hungary shifted into a dark period as a police state after the Revolution was quickly suppressed.