Under the Mountains

1920 60 minutes Directed by Béla Balogh

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About Under the Mountains

Marta, a miller's daughter, is mistress to the indebted landowner Sebastiano. To marry Lujza, daughter of a rich dealer, and to kill the gossip, he weds Marta to Pedro, a mountain shepherd who had hauled him out of a ravine. Pedro does not know her past. She first shuts him out of her room, then loves his plain courage and tells him that Sebastiano used her poverty. Lujza breaks the engagement. Sebastiano tries to take Marta back, forces her to dance in front of the village, and comes at Pedro with a knife. In the fight the blade goes into Sebastiano. Pedro takes Marta up into the mountains.

Cast & crew

More about Under the Mountains

Béla Balogh directed József Pakots's script from the libretto of Eugen d'Albert's opera Tiefland, by Rudolf Lothar, itself taken from Àngel Guimerà's play Terra baixa. Star Filmgyár held a press show at the Omnia cinema and opened the film on 7 July 1920. The print was tinted. Houses played d'Albert's score with an orchestra.

Themes

  • a mistress married off to cover a debt
  • a shepherd who does not know her past
  • a forced public dance
  • a knife that turns on its owner
  • miller's daughter
  • landowner
  • shepherd
  • forced marriage
  • knife fight
  • mountains

Making

Pakots worked from the opera libretto rather than only from the Catalan play. Dezső Nagy was the cinematographer. The National Film Institute lists the running time as 60 minutes; a film-lexicon entry gives 58.

Look

Dezső Nagy photographed it. In the knife fight Balogh cuts to hands on the blade, to Marta's face, and to Pedro just missing the stab.

Music

Cinemas accompanied the silent print with Eugen d'Albert's Tiefland, played by an orchestra.

Preservation

A tinted print survives, carrying Czech intertitles. The National Film Institute of Hungary holds it among its canonical features.

Notes

  • The Hungarian title is Hegyek alján.
  • Ila Lóth plays Marta, Oszkár Dénes plays Sebastiano, Iván Petrovich plays Pedro, and Magda Posner plays Lujza.
  • László Mihó plays Maruccio, the miller's apprentice. Soma Szarvasi plays Tomasso.
  • The surviving copy carries Czech intertitles and keeps Guimerà's character names. The current Hungarian version retains them.
  • Tiefland had already been a success in Budapest after its 1908 premiere there, and it was still on the opera bill while the film was being shot.

Scenes

  • Pedro pulls Sebastiano out of a ravine and is later given Marta as a wife.
  • Sebastiano forces Marta to dance in front of the village.
  • In the struggle his knife goes into his own body, and Pedro takes Marta into the mountains.

Influenced by

  • Àngel Guimerà's play Terra baixa
  • Eugen d'Albert's opera Tiefland

Also available

  • Wikimedia Commons (Hegyek alján, Béla Balogh, 1920.webm)