Venice Film Festival 2023: Explanation For Everything (Orizzonti) | Review

Gábor Reisz presents his impressive feature, Explanation for Everything at Venice 80. A bracing and contentious drama about an accusation due to political beliefs complicating the future for each person involved.

In a global relation of political differences, Gábor Reisz’s sets forth a political story based on a true story from a high school in Budapest, Hungary. He stated that in 2021, “the University of Theatre and Film Arts, Budapest list its autonomy when it was completely reorganized from above as directed by the state.” In Reisz’s adaptation, it is set at the end of high school, right before the graduating class’s final exam which shows the events that may lead to the education shift. It is no question that the divide between politics and generations are touchy subjects that almost have no room for debate due to their pre-conceived beliefs, therefore allowing prejudice, racism, and hostile debate between the two sides.

At 153 minutes, Reisz’s Explanation for Everything shows the quotidian of Abel, an unambitious student who’s trying to get by. An intelligent student in other subjects, but lacks the motivation to study history for his final exam. The film appears at first to seem neither liberal or conservative, showing an unbiased lens to deter the viewer’s side. The film opens in a documentary format where we watch a group of young adults attending a memorial or holiday. It is later revealed that that footage is of March 15, the anniversary date of Hungarian revolution in 1848. Shortly after, we see a reporter open a recording of Abel. Abel ignores his studies and lives care-free, which has an unexpected humor because of his lack of attention of the future. His closest friend, Janka and him are on the cusp of an intimate relationship, only for Janka’s to hesitate towards Abel’s lackadaisical mindset.

Reisz structures the film around an accusation towards Jakob, a former teacher of his due to wearing the Hungarian nationality pin during his final exams, eventually failing him causing controversy and conspiracy. The film looks through many of the involved people’s perspectives in the case of accusation including Abel, Gyorgy, Abel’s father, Jakob, the teacher on the committee of the final exam, and Erika, a Romanian reporter who breaks the story to national news. With these perspectives, we see a glimpse of Hungarian society, the origins of Abel’s behavior through Gyorgy, and the opposing viewpoints from Jakob, who heavily favors a liberal background.

With the framework set, Reisz enters a space of clichés and predictability since cinema nowadays are heavily favored towards leftist views. Reisz uses shifting perspectives by the day through texts that state who we are following and what day it is. This structure is commonly used (Elephant [2003], Monster [2023]) because it strongly supports the plot by its timing of unveiled information. We go through the lead up and aftermath of Abel’s exam. We see his nihilistic tendencies towards life, while Gyorgy, an architect, holds strong views towards his nation of Hungary. He makes sly comments towards others that explains his conservatism such as his distaste towards foreigners, the younger generation, and his support of Viktor Orbán. Jakob, the high school teacher is beloved amongst his students from his teachings to his good looks. Abel uses his father’s beliefs and Janka’s confession against Jakob and the accusation, thus leading to a climatic thriller of ethics and gray area politics.

The title (a great one) could be considered the hypothesis of the film and society. Everyone has an explanation for everything and no matter how much facts or support you have towards your argument; because in the end, it doesn’t even matter. Reisz demonstrates this through his script and structure, allowing the events to be more dramatic by introducing new elements to the controversy in a concise and not in overbearing ways. The end gravitates to a predicatable and conventional storyline, but Reisz’s exposition on Hungary’s society from three different generations, shows a progressive outlook through education. It’s a hot topic that will last decades towards left vs right, and Reisz shows us both directions, leading us to a point of reward and retaliation from both sides.