Taxidermia

Taxidermia

91 Minutes

Taxidermia is a great film- the work of a visionary and features wonderful performances, fantastic cinematography and a fascinating observation of the importance of being remembered. What it is not, however, is easy to stomach: the film is deeply steeped in the black humor and grotesque nature of the Czech New Wave and its offshoots. Director Gyorgy Palfi is not one to shy away, preferring to use his lens in almost an academic fashion; studying, observing and probing every inch of his subjects.

The film is based on the absurdist writings of famed Hungarian writer Lajos Parti Nagy, and follows the timeline of three extraordinary individuals. The film opens with Morosgovanyi Vender (frequent collaborator Csaba Czene,) a gofer in the Hungarian military that frequently retreats into his fantasies to escape his morose lifestyle. His superior officer, Öreg Balatony Kálmán, constantly harasses him for being so absentminded. Morosgovanyi is lonely and perverse, as evidenced by his frequent usage of glory holes and his visions of making love to the corpses of pigs to stay warm in the evenings. In one of these scenarios he manages to impregnate Kalman’s wife. Kalman finds out, kills him and raises the child as his own.

We then forward to the grown up child, Balatony Kalman, who has evolved into an overweight champion sport eater competing for Hungary, and competing with his partner for the affections of the female champion from the same factory where they work. She and Balatony fall in love and sire a child, Balatony Lajoska, who grows up to be an accomplished taxidermist specializing in large cats. Balatony is haunted by his lineage and appears as almost a black sheep- he is thin, gaunt and looks after his father, who has become an enormous shut-in with cages full of cats he feeds butter.

At the crux of Taxidermia is the idea of making an imprint, of being remembered for one’s accomplishments. All three characters struggle with the ideas of their lineage and with their individual talents- Morosgovanyi shoots fire from his penis, Kalman has a seemingly bottomless stomach and Lajoska is skilled with his hands. These somewhat off-kilter talents are played very straight, but their very absurdness creates a wonderfully dark comedic palate. Palfi savors the grotesqueness, with several sustained shots of Morosgovanyi playing with fire or Kalman shoveling soup down this throat and then promptly throwing it up between rounds. Being forced to watch these events as they occur unsettles, but it also fascinates.

The film is gorgeously shot by cinematographer Gergely Poharnok, using several muted color tones to suggest an aged painting and his expert motility of the camera makes for remarkable scenarios. He allows Palfi to use his camera kinetically as well as studiously. However, Taxidermia is not for the squeamish- Palfi turns an unflinching eye just as much to the blood and guts of dismembered pigs and farm animals as he does to the genitals of his leads. A discussion about the best part of a woman is supplemented by rapid-fire images of the anatomy part in question. His usage of a non-judgmental view is great at flipping the conventions of acceptable nudity. Much like his focus on the actions of his characters, Palfi finds a dark amusement in seeing what exactly he can force his audience to endure, and he’s excellent at mitigating the tension of discomfort with the comfort of humor that comes as a by-product of such a scenario.

As the film ends, Lajoska creates his final masterpiece, literally bleeding for his art. He encloses himself in a homemade surgery box and proceeds to have himself decapitated and maimed, and the movie closes as patrons visit his final exhibit, where his naked torso and his father’s body have been put on display. This ending turns Palfi’s vision on his own audience, as the curator narrates about certain things being unmountable. It is a touching and rational moment in an otherwise eccentric film; as the camera slowly zooms into the centerpiece of Lajoska, the spell this film casts, like the shot, is unbreakable. Taxidermia gets under your skin, and it stays with you- it mounts itself in your memory long after the final frame.

by Rafael Gaitan