FILMIO Cinema Club – Sinbad

As part of the NFI Film Club On Wednesday 25 November 2026, from 6.00 pm Those who are interested can watch the Hungarian colour film *Sinbad*.
Faced with death, Sinbad (Zoltán Latinovits) looks back on his life. Old photographs and treasured letters bring to mind past loves and fleeting romances. In his wandering memories, sometimes a woman’s smile, sometimes a sumptuous restaurant meal brings back the pleasurable moments of the past.
What makes it special?
The film is based on Gyula Krúdy’s ‘Sinbad’ short stories. The title character’s name evokes the seafaring hero of *One Thousand and One Nights*, who this time wanders not across distant seas but through the mysterious landscapes of the human soul. *Sinbad* is a particularly beautiful, lyrical film, in which the fluid world of memory is reflected in freely flowing images. Past and present, imagination and reality flow inseparably into one another, whilst the protagonist’s monologues accompany the erratic play of the imagination. Composed of various episodes and montages, the film has no traditional plot, narrative arc or definitive chronological sequence that can be pieced together retrospectively. The individual scenes are constantly interrupted by fleeting associations and feelings, and the sensory impressions of locations and objects. Our protagonist hovers between reality and imagination, musing on life’s ultimate questions as he stands on the threshold of death. As the viewer wanders through his visions, they too can sense something of the transience of time as it rushes by.
Zoltán Huszárik constructs a unique world from fragments of events, beautiful visual snippets and subjective impressions.
The fleeting images are bound together by a strong internal logic; the film floats along in a dreamlike manner. *Sinbad* captures a distinctive sense of life, in which drifting and the pursuit of pleasure, a longing to escape and a love of life form a peculiar blend. The hero’s inner journey is suffused with the bittersweet aura of nostalgia, whilst beauty emerges in ever-changing forms. The film explores the timeless mystery of existence and, transcending the traditional modes of expression of the moving image, becomes poetry in its own right.