The Land of Mirage

Young Petőfi Zoltán the son of the great Hungarian poet, Petőfi Sándor, feels as though he were a stranger in the house of his mother and stepfather. Off he goes, finding work in Debrecen, where his theatrical and literary career and love all seem to be on their way.

This drama follows the dilemma of a young, unwillingly pregnant wife who gives her child up for adoption by a businesswoman. Anna doesn't need another mouth to feed. She can barely afford to care for the two she already has so when she discovers that she is six weeks pregnant she readily accepts the cash offer from Terez, her tough boss at the store where she works. If she will isolate herself throughout the pregnancy, secretly bear the child and immediately allow Terez to sign for it, Anna will receive $50,000. Most of the story then focuses upon Anna's emotional processes as she evaluates her choice. Included are dream segments and shots an unborn baby in the womb.

A day in the solitary life of Pista, a single child of divorced parents. The boy skips school and explores the city of Budapest by himself, yet can't escape an unbearable ennui. Like Mészáros's ADOPTION, this early short film explores the themes of broken family bonds; it also offers insight into the origins of the director’s career.

A continuation of "Diary for My Children," the film picks up in 1950, when Juli, the diarist, is 18 and determined to become a movie director.

A candid portrait of the women working at the Lőrinc spinning mill. As with so many of Mészáros’ shorts, this work has foundations in autobiography, and she would later return to this particular world in one of her fiction features.

The lifelong friendship of Edith Piaf and Marlene Dietrich.

Short movie by Marta Meszaros

After having lost her parents, young Juli returns from the Soviet Union to her native Budapest. Scarred by the wounds of the past, the ghost of Stalin’s oppression haunts her as she reunites with her aunt and adoptive mother Magda.

When middle-aged Kata realises that her life will only be complete if she has a baby of her own, her longstanding-but-married boyfriend Joska refuses to comply. But by developing an unlikely friendship with the angst-ridden teenage orphan Anna, who is also involved in a controversial relationship, Kata discovers aspects of herself, and her role as a woman, that have gone unexamined throughout her entire, lonely life.

During the rising of nazism, Sylvia, a rich but sterile woman, needs an heir to inherit her father's money. So she bribes Irene, a Jewish girl, to have a child by her husband.

The Aurora Borealis is a story of family that is rich in twists and turns. It breaks the depths of the relationship between mother and daughter. A successful lawyer in Vienna, Olga is called back to Hungary when her old mother, Mary suddenly falls into a coma. While Mary is floating between life and death, Olga finds a deeply silent secret. The increasingly passionate research leads back to the post-war Europe of the '50s.

An expressionist biography of Edith Stein, who converted from the Jewish faith to the Catholic one and became a Carmelite sister. She would die in a German concentration camp.

On receiving a letter from her mother, a quiet working-class girl leaves the state orphanage in Budapest where she grew up and takes a trip to the rural countryside to visit her.

Jutka, a young woman who works in a factory, falls in love with Andras, a university student. She pretends to be a student, to him and to his parents, and begins to live a lie. Finally she rebels against Andras and his demands and the social conventions that forced her to live a lie.

Looking for a safe place to live after being harassed by her husband, a depressive and violent man, Juli stays at a women's shelter run by Mária.

Juli, who works in a brick factory, begins a romantic relationship with her boss, to whom she hides the fact that she has a son.