The Angelmakers

A small village in the Hungarian countryside appears to have a dubious past: in 1929, a series of arsenic murders was exposed here, and 51 women were arrested on suspicion of poisoning their husbands and relatives. The arsenic they used had apparently been taken from flypaper. In total, there were 140 cases of murder, for which many women went to prison. Besides a reconstruction of the killings, this film is a portrait of the present inhabitants of Nagyrev, who all remember something different about the murders. They also muse about the current exodus from the village, are worried about a melon theft and complain about the fact that life in the village is boring: there is no cinema or aerobics club. The desolation and isolation of the village is captured quietly and carefully: a stooped man shuffles past, a house stands empty on the edge of the village. The director filmed at the kitchen table, on the ferry and on a bench in front of a house, where an elderly couple recalls how they got married within two months of meeting one another: "He needed someone to mend the fishing nets." (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam)