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Béla Tarr presents The Turin Horse

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FICM Director Daniela Michel, who welcomed Tarr before a packed
theater, said:

"We are presenting the Mexican premiere of a master work. The Turin Horse is an extraordinary film
by the most important contemporary director. We have the great honor to share
this screening with a director who we greatly admire and who has had a great
influence on young filmmakers."

She encouraged the audience to see Tarr's five films that are being
screened during this year's festival. "You have to see Sátántangó," she said. "We hope
it isn't true that he doesn't want to continue making films, as he has said,
because he is truly an extraordinary artist."

After a long, enthusiastic applause, Tarr thanked the audience for
coming to see his film "when you could have done thousands of other
things."

"But you came to see me, this black-and-white film, that is long
and boring. It is a cold film, ugly, miserable... It's true, but I love
it."

Michel also welcomed his film editor Ágnes Hranitzky, whom she
described as an "extraordinary woman."

"As you know she has been very linked to Béla Tarr's creative
process," she added. "She began working, editing, right when they
started shooting the film. They have a great artistic understanding."

The Turin Horse begins with the
following anecdote. "In Turin on January 3, 1889, Friedrich Nietzsche
steps out of the doorway of No. 6 Via Carlo Albert. Not far from him, the
driver of a hansom cab is having trouble with a stubborn horse. Despite all his
urging, the horse refuses to move, whereupon the driver loses his patience and
whips it. Nietzsche comes up to the throng and puts an end to the brutal scene,
throwing his arms around the horse's neck and sobbing. His landlord takes him
home, where he lies motionless and silent for two days on a couch until he
mutters his last words. He goes on to live for another 10 years, silent and
demented, cared for by his mother and sisters. 'We do not know what happened to
the horse.'"

Once put into this context, the film tells the story of six days in the
lives of a driver, his daughter and a horse, in an impressive black-and-white
landscape as they try to survive an indescribable and apocalyptic windstorm.
Living in the middle of nowhere and facing imminent destruction, these three
characters confront the inevitable with dignity.

At the end of the screening, Tarr, whose films are characterized by the
purity of their visual narrative and the careful management of time, answered
the numerous questions from the audience.