Hungary, 2004, 35mm, 90', colour, Dolby Surround, in Hungarian with English subtitles. Adult audience.
The kids of the district grew up in constant rivaling and fights, as their Gypsy, Hungarian, Arab, and Chinese families engage in everyday hostility. Yet Richie, the youngest of the Lakatos clan attempts to find a way to pacify the Csorba family, and especially their lovely daughter, Jules. As he soon reveals, the way to peace is through money, and that the only way to make money is to have oil. So the kids take a time-trip to the prehistoric age, and create their own oil reserves right under the district. After their return the exploitation of oil begins, radically changing the stance both in the school and in the general criminal environment of the area. And their sudden success draws some unwanted international attention to the district...
“Director Áron Gauder’s animation is a fresh, hypnotic tangle of caricatured figures and textured layers. The raw, inimitable style complements this rambunctious, rough-and-tumble street story.”
Colin Geddes, Toronto International Film Festival
“The plot of Nyócker! is a modern Romeo and Juliet story from Józsefváros, which is fortunately derailed early on from the good old Verona thread, and places the emphasis on efficient teamwork and survival instead of the literary execution of the young lovers while the love thread is discarded with a post-modern whisk.”
Marci Csillag, Filmkultura
“Fifteen credited artists labored over the distinct animated style, a jerky collage in which cutouts of actors' heads are blended with animated bodies and surroundings; result is crude yet novel.”
Eddie Cockrell, Variety
“Is it Hungary's answer to South Park or to Angela Anaconda? The combination of obscenity-spewing characters and subtly sophisticated, sometimes photo-realistic animation makes The District! very much its own vulgar beast.”
Jason Anderson, Eye Weekly
“The animation is amazingly rich in detail and is simply gorgeous. The film is kinetic, ambitious and stylish.”
Twitch film
“A raw, raunchy and irreverent social satire, the eye-popping adult animation feature Nyocker! manages to take on just about every racial stereotype as well as world leaders, from Dubya to Osama, without ever missing a cool Hungarian hip-hop beat. Added to this goulash is a Romeo and Juliet storyline given a liberated-teen twist, time travel, the oil crisis and an American missile named Freedom aimed at Budapest "terrorists."
Ottawa Xpress
Áron Gauder
After graduating from the Hungarian Academy of Applied Arts (animation department) in 1999 Áron Gauder started his computer animation career at Kosmo Studio. His diploma work, The Helping Soul, was made with film carving technique. Áron has been working on several feature film projects as CG visual effects director. In 2001, he created an interactive animation for the Hungarian National Museum.He is renowned in Hungary for his mixed media animation techniques. His short films include Klaustrofobie (97), Bersecker (98), Wondermill (98), Helping Soul (99). In 2002, he made a documentary short on Iceland and took part in various international animated short film projects in Germany.
Katalin Macskássy, Hungary, 2003, 35mm, 7’, ap/es
The original Gypsy tale is about the desire of the Romani for freedom. In the Gypsy settlement the children listen to the legend and in their imagination the tale comes alive. They »paint« the drab, black and white world with bright colours. They colour reality and the tale makes the bitter present bearable for them.