Melodrama (Melodráma)
(1990, feature, colour, 100 min.)

Director: Péter Gothár
Screenplay: Péter Gothár
Writer: Péter Gothár
Story editor: Zsuzsa Bíró
Director of photography: Sándor Kardos
Editor: Péter Tímár
Music: György Selmeczi
Sound: János Réti
Visual design: Zsolt Khell
Costumes: Györgyi Szakács
Production manager: András Ozorai
Producer: Sándor Simó
Production company: Hunnia Film Studio
Cast: Mari Nagy, Tibor Bitskey, Kati Lázár, József Szarvas, István Gyuricza, Andor Lukáts, Attila Magyar, Andrea Söptei

The preceding events. August, 1968. The "friendly troops" or the Warsaw Pact have just marched into Czechoslovakia. Feri and Tomka, two Hungarian privates are among them.
They have been old, childhood friends, they were conscripted together and serve in the same company. They fall in love at the same time with Jula, a Hungarian girl living in Slovakia. Soon the girl expects a baby. But is Feri the father? Or Tomka? It doesn't matter. The three of them get into a tank and decide to run away into the Free World.
Vienna is only half an hour away from here, from the highway. Feri jumps out of the tank, he waits for the other two but they are not coming. They are scared. Or they have betrayed him. The commander notices that someone is trying to run away, there is confusion, shots are fired and Feri seriously injures the elderly officer. He is sentenced to life imprisonment, which means he gets released in 20 years' time.
20 years passed but the passion is still alive. Jula is beautiful and young, she lives together with Tomka and there is the child - a 20 year old boy, Lali, the other protagonist of the film.
A clash - Tomka gets scared of Feri and tries to escape through the window. Feri roams the streets. Lali finds him, they stay together getting to know each other. There is only one thing Feri is eager to know, what happened to the family while he was in prison? What happened during the past 20 years? Lali, in turn, would like to find out who this man is and he knows that if he finds out more about him he will learn more about his mother. Tomka and himself, too. Their wanderings are a series or adventures of past events and of striking up a present relationship. We are in Eastern Europe, each extreme adventure provides a caricature of life. It is ridiculous and melancholic at the same time. But the two of them get to know each other better and better, the ties between the two of them grow stronger and stronger...
The conclusion is inevitable. Tomka also leads a second life. With another family... Another woman. Berta... Feri's childhood love! The one time close friend has deprived Feri of everything, even his past. The moment comes when the son takes revenge for "the father". Lali shoots Tomka.
The circle is complete. But Lali decides to step out of the circle, he doesn't want to spend 20 years in prison. He leaves Hungary. And Feri grows old completely abandoned by the world.