In the ElkXrtuk trial, the biased judge helped the pollster near Gyurcsány in an unprecedented way .
I felt like I was in the movie The Witness (1969), in which the verdict was already in place, all that was needed was a confession. Seeing the judge's litigation technique, the verdict did not come as a surprise - said producer Gábor Kálomista in an interview with Origo after the first instance verdict of the lawsuit initiated by Endre Hann, who heads the public opinion polling company Median. According to the creator of the film ElkXrtuk, not only the judge's technique, but also his behavior and the way he helped the plaintiff during the trial, did not meet the requirements for conducting the trial. He told Origo about what happened in the first instance proceedings and how the producer sees the application of the double standard.
Last December, a verdict was announced in the Endre Hann trial, in which the Capital Court ordered the producer of the film ElkXrtuk, Gábor Kálomista, and the producer Megafilm Kft. to pay HUF 1.5 million in damages. According to the verdict, the defendant violated the privacy rights of Hann Endre, the executive director of the Median Public Opinion and Market Research Institute, not with the film itself, but with the communication related to it. Hann sued the producer of the feature film dealing with the leak of Ferenc Gyurcsány's Ószöd speech and the producer of the film because, according to him, the character who is one of the key figures in the work was modeled on him and portrayed in a negative light. (The film features a pollster from Gyurcsány, who is otherwise unscrupulously fraudulent - it is surprising that Endre Hann is known for himself.)
Origó asked producer Gábor Kálomista about the verdict and the procedure.
After the decision of the Metropolitan Court in December, the trial can continue in the second instance. You have submitted your appeal. Why did you decide that?
The subject of my appeal remains that
creative and artistic freedom is being trampled in the mud in the Hungarian court.
As a filmmaker, I have never experienced someone suing a film or a work in such a way that, according to their claim, there is nothing wrong with it. In court, we agreed with the plaintiff Hann Endre that what the Gyurcsánys committed at the time, in 2006, was a crime.
On the model of this lawsuit, think how absurd it would be if the British royal family started suing the series The Crown, or the Gucci family started suing its creators for the movie House of Gucci.
Gábor Kálomista, the film's producer, does not understand why it is necessary to prove the reality of a fictional film. Source: Megafilm/Tamás Dombóvári
What we created is an existing genre in other parts of the world. So was the movie Nixon at the time, so anyone familiar with political thrillers knows how
it deliberately contains fictional elements, since the filmmakers cannot be there when the real event took place, so they carry out the widest possible research and try to reconstruct what could have happened at the given time.
We also did this through fictional threads. Criticizing this is trampling artistic and creative freedom into the mud, and I would quietly note here that the left-liberal media is deeply silent at this point.
How do you evaluate the first instance procedure?
Unfortunately, the double standard is not only present, but also palpable. Moreover
in court, the judge amended the plaintiff's statement of claim three times over the course of three trial days, presumably in order to have a suitable statement of claim available for the judgment he had already made in his mind.
Endre's character and his film intern, Réka, in a scene from the film Elk.rtuk. Source: Megafilm
After all, in Hungarian law, the principle of being tied to the claim prevails: the court can only deal with what the plaintiff requests from the court in its claim.
I felt like I was in the movie The Witness Seeing the judge's litigation technique, the verdict did not come as a surprise.
Not only his technique, but also his behavior and the way he helped the plaintiff during the trial, in my opinion, but also according to my lawyers, did not meet the requirements of trial management.
When a judge visibly sides with one of the parties, it can be rightly objected to.
To this day, we maintain that the film ElkXrtuk is a work of art and the protection of creative freedom is important. I've experienced many things, but I've never seen anything like this. We were shocked by what happened. At least we got to the point where the left-liberal side no longer wants to ban the film, it was no longer requested in the lawsuit. In the original lawsuit, however, they asked the court to ban me from making films. Let's think about how Béla Pintér's The Champion , which is about the internal family problems of a living politician, is considered brilliant because they think it should reflect on the present, but at the same time, if I dared to make a film about the events of 2006, then the intolerable.
Was there really a breach of reputation, or did Endre Hann misunderstand the essence of Endre's character in the film?
Filmmakers work based on archetypes, and the film deals with a series of events that happened.
At that time, Endre Hann worked for the Gyurcsány government and had a portfolio of public opinion polls worth about HUF 700 million. He did the polls himself, which he admitted.
We can rightly assume that the Endre who appears in the film may be similar to Endre Hann, but even Hann Endre himself did not recognize the character. This is the most shocking. Barna Bokor, who plays the character of Endre, is a smart young man who put his services in the wrong direction. I didn't even understand Hann's objection in court: he said that it was funny to meet the Minister of Secrets György Szilvássy in 2006, but they met then. He even admitted that they did political research and decided cases based on that. Of course, the judge let this go by the ear. Fortunately, we recorded this, so we have the complete video and audio material.
I would like to emphasize that during the making of the film, we made sure that the name of Endre Hann and Median did not appear in the film. It is true that it came up in the communication surrounding the film, there was speculation as to who was who in the film, and yes, it could even have been Endre Hann.
I consider it important to mention that on Wednesday I legally won a lawsuit regarding the left-wing press product Hírklikk, where the court condemned them because they accused me of money laundering, fraud and theft, which was proven to be untrue.
However, they were only fined HUF 200,000 for this. In contrast, Megafilm was fined 1.5 million.
What do you expect from your second degree?
I will go all the way, I will protect myself and my film. The truth must come out!
From the second degree, but basically, I only expect a fair court procedure. What happened is nonsense, and we let the genie out of the bottle with this, because almost anyone can sue anyone for almost anything.
I would like the court to really clarify this matter, and if necessary we will go to the highest forum.
Source: origo.hu
In our opening image: The court will announce a verdict in the ElkXrtuk trial on December 16, 2022. Source: Mandiner/Dávid Mátrai
