MAGYAR AMERICAN: 2015/02

Tuesday, February 24, 2015

GLASS WALL FILM - FILM NOIR : MAGYAR AMERICAN FILM REVIEW

I watched the film on this DVD.

Here is a promotional poster for the 1953 film.

The film THE GLASS WALL is about a Hungarian-Jew, a Holocaust survivor who makes it to New York but is about to be sent back to Europe by Immigration. He pleas his case that he had befriended an American, a musician who plays somewhere in Times Square. His only hope is that he find this musician, who by now has a serious girlfriend who is helping him find a better job so that they can afford to mar, so that the man can testify for him. So Vincent, this man, runs for his life and is homeless on the streets of New York but finds himself befriended by a Blonde who steals a coat to pawn so she won't get evicted, as well as a Hungarian immigrant and her daughter, who help him.

Enter GOULASH on film. Goulash is a healing meal. And as mama and daughter cook it and serve it up, no one asks if it's Kosher.

This film is one of those that got the Go at a studio where there was concern for the plight of WWII Jewish immigrants who sometimes found themselves without a country, their families dead, their home towns decimated, who traveled to the United States, as well as how their country men and women in the United States had empathy and tried to help them within their means. It presents Hungarian ethnic immigrants to the American Viewer sympathetically.

In the end the musician is found and the Holocaust survivor finds himself on the Right side of immigration and accepted by his new country.

Worth a watch, especially if you like Film Noir.

Thursday, February 19, 2015

"ED WOOD" FILM BASED ON REAL LIFE HOLLYWOOD PRODUCER WHO LOVED BELA LAGOSI and EMPLOYED HIM AT THE END OF HIS LIFE

Since I'm always interested in how Hungarians and Hungarian- Americans are thought of, stereotyped, and portrayed in the media, including Hollywood films, I decided to watch the film "Ed Wood" a second time.

The film is based on the true life story of a independent producer, the only one in his time who was writing, directing, and producing films other than Orson Wells, named Ed Wood. Always looking for creative ways to finance films that were B movies - horror - science fiction - he often employed people who were not actors but who had some money to invest. Many of the early fans of his movies were kids who attended matinees.

A possible exception to that rule of hiring unknowns and the talentless might be Bela Lugosi, known for portraying the menacing Hungarian capable of scaring you to death if not outright murder, a stereotype that stems from the mythologies of Count Dracula, installed in his castle in Transylvania.

In Ed's case he was a Bela Lugosi fan as a kid, met him in Hollywood when he was near 70 and near broke, as well as rumored to have been a drug addict for many years, a "washed up" actor. Ed was able to give Bela some employment as well as become a friend to the end, and so the actor achieved a brief revival of fame.

Ed himself is portrayed, by Johnny Depp, as endlessly optimistic and inventive, as well as a cross dresser who loves women and befriended and hired many eccentric characters included transsexuals. He may have never become well regarded or famous, but the wife who married him stayed with Ed 20 years to his death, early, of alcohol.

To give it a Film Noir effect, this film is in black and white, which is extremely effective.

Monday, February 16, 2015

HOW GENEALOGY RESEARCH INFORMED MY SENSE OF HUNGARIAN IDENTITY

Although I knew from an early age that my heritage was Hungarian and that was different than say, Irish or English, or Italian or Native American, as a grade school student I didn't know exactly what it meant.

As an adult I heard a story retold about my father being unmercifully teased in ways that other children intended to hurt his self esteem with name calling and so on when he was a child. He came home crying. The story goes that my grandfather told my father "No one here is original but for the American Indian."

But my dad never said much about being of Hungarian ethnic heritage or what that meant for his father or himself growing up or as an adult. He didn't seem ashamed nor did he seem proud.

These days DNA research is expanding our consciousness about pre-historic movement of populations and, it could be argued, is proving to us that ethnic identity is a fairly recent aspect of human life on this planet. I enjoy being in a more multicultural environment where it is easy to learn a bit about other people's ethnic customs and cultures, even if in the United States what outlasts the way people built homes or wore clothes or spoke in another language, is ethnic cooking. I have to say that I have never experienced it that anyone from these other cultures was interested in my ethnicity or heritage.

When I began genealogy research I didn't realize what finding a person's baptismal records in a small town church record would lead me to. It wasn't enough for me to have the record or even link it to siblings, parents, grandparents, great grandparents. I wanted to put these people into as accurate a socio-cultural context as I could, so I started reading around the subject, and my research took me to archives and even the library of one of the biggest art institutions in the U.S.

When I began genealogy research I began to meet some people who were like minded in their quest for information about their own families, and more apt to not only share research tactics but listen to me when I talked my family - or bragged!

Saturday, February 14, 2015

TO MY VALENTINE

Tuesday, February 3, 2015

VILMA BANKY : HUNGARIAN SILENT SCREEN STAR IN HOLLYWOOD

VILMA BANKY a web site dedicated to her.

VILMA BANKY was born January 9, 1901 in Nagydorog, Austria-Hungary
and died March 18, 1991 in Los Angeles, California. She became a silent screen star and made films for about five years. I thought these tribute YouTube videos were well done! Here she is with Rudolph Valentino.

IMBD FILMOGRAPHY for VILMA BANKY