The Turin Horse (2011) on Netflix
A coach driver in Turin whips a stubborn horse, and Friedrich Nietzsche throws his arms around its neck. A cart driver and his daughter haul loads with an old horse.
- Netflix4.2/5
- IMDb7.7/1021,744 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes89%
Trailer
Plot summary
On 3 January 1889 in Turin, a coach driver loses his temper with a stubborn horse and takes his whip to it. Friedrich Nietzsche throws his arms around the horse's neck and sobs. His neighbor takes him home, where he lies silent. In the countryside, possibly the Great Hungarian Plain of the 19th century, a coach driver lives there with his daughter and the horse. Windstorms rage outside their hut, and the two of them keep to an arduous, repetitive routine.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Turin Horse (2011)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Hungary's Mokep cancelled its planned 10 March 2011 release of the film after director Béla Tarr told the newspaper Der Tagesspiegel that the Hungarian government was waging a "culture war" on artists and intellectuals. The film premiered in Hungary on 31 March 2011 instead.
- The film began in the mid-1980s, when co-writer László Krasznahorkai told Béla Tarr the story of Nietzsche's breakdown and Tarr asked what happened to the horse; the pair wrote a short synopsis in 1990 but shelved it to make Sátántangó.
- The house, well and stable in the Hungarian valley where the film was shot were built specifically for it, and were proper structures of stone and wood rather than artificial sets.
- The shoot was planned as 35 days in November and December 2008, but adverse weather meant principal photography on Béla Tarr's film was not finished until 2010.
- The film never had a conventional screenplay; co-writer László Krasznahorkai's prose text was what the filmmakers used to find financial partners.
