{"id":653101,"date":"2026-05-07T05:32:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T05:32:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/653101\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T05:32:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T05:32:08","slug":"somehow-you-become-the-chicken-inside-the-film-about-people-smuggling-told-through-the-eyes-of-a-hen-movies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/653101\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Somehow you become the chicken\u2019: inside the film about people-smuggling told through the eyes of a hen | Movies"},"content":{"rendered":"

If oppressive regimes inadvertently give rise to striking artistic works of resistance, then Hen might just be a parting gift from Viktor Orb\u00e1n\u2019s far-right regime. This compelling, original film, told from the perspective of a hen, was only made because Hungarian film-maker Gy\u00f6rgy P\u00e1lfi could no longer create anything in his home country. Orb\u00e1n\u2019s 16 years of cronyism banished any chance of funding a film in Budapest, so P\u00e1lfi \u2013 who has directed eight wildly original films, from his near-wordless 2002 debut Hukkle to 2006\u2019s visually striking<\/a> and grotesque Taxidermia \u2013 was driven into exile. Searching for a universal story he could tell even when filming in a culture or country he didn\u2019t fully understand, he and co-writer and partner Zs\u00f3fia Ruttkay settled on a biopic of a factory-farmed chicken.<\/p>\n

The hen escapes her gruesome, industrial birthplace in Greece and, through her naturally comic beady eyes, we witness the unfolding of a modern-day Greek tragedy, whereby a down-at-heel restaurateur is drawn into the brutal world of people-smuggling.<\/p>\n

double quotation markIn terms of a hierarchy, it was hard for our human actors to accept that they were beneath the chickens<\/p>\n

I video-call P\u00e1lfi the day after Orb\u00e1n is voted out and, like many Hungarians, he\u2019s full of smiles and relief. \u201cOrb\u00e1n wasn\u2019t a real prime minister,\u201d he says. \u201cHe just supported those who voted for him, not all Hungarians. That was for 16 years \u2013 and it got worse and worse, every year, every hour. The new prime minister gave a beautiful speech but, you know, he has 70% of the parliament, which means total power again. We just hope he will control himself and give the power back. He\u2019s promising real democratic stuff, so let\u2019s see.\u201d<\/p>\n

With no financial support available for independent film-making in Hungary<\/a>, P\u00e1lfi headed first to Mexico, gradually developing the idea of making his star a powerless chicken, through whose adventures would be woven a human story. After his producer identified an opportunity to film \u2013 and find funding \u2013 in Greece, the people-smuggling theme emerged. \u201cWhen we find this very small chicken meets with a huge social problem, then it can be a good movie,\u201d says P\u00e1lfi, who moved his family to Greece for a year \u201cto learn about the people\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u2018This very small chicken meets with a huge social problem\u2019 \u2026 the star of Hen goes into action. Photograph: Pallas Film<\/p>\n

The film begins very deliberately, by simply following our heroine hen\u2019s birth and escape from factory-farming shackles. \u201cIf you can go with the chicken after the first 15 or 20 minutes,\u201d says P\u00e1lfi, \u201cthen somehow you become the chicken, and people become a higher level, like the gods of ancient Greek mythology. It\u2019s very interesting. That was the most important thing \u2013 to change the perspective.\u201d<\/p>\n

When the hen is rescued from the jaws of his dog by Giorgos, an ageing restaurateur whose shabby seaside business is shuttered for more than just a season, a human tragedy begins to unfold. Giorgos lives with his small granddaughter and his frustrated daughter whose ne\u2019er-do-well boyfriend brings a modest smuggling operation \u2013 booze and fags \u2013 to his door. While Hen enjoys a comic romantic encounter with the household cockerel, Giorgos is drawn into a more ambitious smuggling scheme: bringing people into Europe<\/a>.<\/p>\n

To tell this story, P\u00e1lfi had to mobilise eight identical leading ladies. Eszti, Szandi, Feri, Enci, Eti, Enik\u0151, N\u00f3ra and Anett play the part of the plucky black hen. Each was trained for two months before the shoot, to become \u201chuman friendly\u201d. An animal trainer handled them during filming, and although P\u00e1lfi struggled to tell them apart, they soon realised that each chicken possessed a special power. One was good at running, another at pecking and a third kept beautifully still when required. So they chose whichever star would shine, given the requirements of the scene.<\/p>\n

Because a merciless shoestring shooting schedule required them to shoot 50 days of script in 35 days, the Greek cast had to accept a novel hierarchy: lining up the chickens for the cameras came first. \u201cIt was hard for the actors to realise they were last in line,\u201d says P\u00e1lfi. And if he hit problems, he would call for his favourite leading lady: Feri. \u201cShe wasn\u2019t so professional at jumping, she wasn\u2019t so professional at running, but she knew everything. She was a jolly joke. And if one hen couldn\u2019t do a scene because maybe she was tired or her stomach was full, we would say, \u2018Bring Feri\u2019 \u2013 and Feri would do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018We play with what a chicken can think \u2013 but we try to use a chicken as a chicken\u2019 … Gy\u00f6rgy P\u00e1lfi. Photograph: Gareth Cattermole\/Getty Images for IMDb<\/p>\n

P\u00e1lfi is renowned for his inventive, experimental films but being led by hens compelled him to become rather more orthodox. He couldn\u2019t dabble with eight-minute-long shots or other fancy arthouse techniques, so instead \u201cchose classical Hollywood storytelling and shot-by-shot movie language. And that was a good decision because the chicken could do it.\u201d So the chickens made him conventional? He grins. \u201cIt\u2019s also a good experiment to make a normal movie.\u201d<\/p>\n

Normal-ish. Hollywood movies depict their stars \u201csomewhere at neck level\u201d says P\u00e1lfi, so he shot Hen at a chicken\u2019s eye level, using a low position. Keen to make his heroine as natural as possible, he used no CGI on the chickens at all. But CGI was deployed to make the animal trainer disappear from the frame. In an early scene, Hen finds herself on the roof of a service station, pursued by a fox. Here, the terrifying scene was made possible because the fox was actually on a leash that was later removed using special effects.<\/p>\n

Hen serves as an innocent eyewitness, through which we see the foibles of human behaviour with new clarity. At times, it almost feels as if her beady gaze is casting moral judgment. \u201cBut this is just happening in the audience\u2019s mind,\u201d says P\u00e1lfi. \u201cThe chicken needs to be a chicken. Sometimes we play with what a chicken can think, but we try very carefully to use a chicken as a chicken.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are comic, romantic scenes but the brutality of life for powerless chickens \u2013 and powerless people \u2013 is laid bare. The film\u2019s revealing scenes of factory farming \u2013 and the quiet desperation we imagine Hen feels when her eggs are repeatedly snatched \u2013 may turn audiences vegetarian, or at least away from factory-farmed chicken. But that was not the intention. \u201cChickens are chickens. And they bite each other, and so they are not a perfect society,\u201d he says. \u201cBut humans should be able to change their way of living to be a bit better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Visually striking and grotesque … a moment from P\u00e1lfi\u2019s Taxidermia. Photograph: Photo 12\/Alamy<\/p>\n

Hoping that life in Hungary will become a bit better under the new government, P\u00e1lfi and his family are living in Budapest again. He wants to write a trilogy of animal films. Next will come a monkey, living in an Indian city. He has a Hungarian outlaw story, too. \u201cNot a western, but an eastern,\u201d he says. I\u2019m surprised when this career-long movie maverick says he would love to make a mainstream film, although he still has an eye on that elusive balance between \u201cthe mainstream and the outer movie, which is the best kind of movie ever, you know \u2013 Kubrick movies, good Ridley Scott movies like Blade Runner. Artistic and mainstream.\u201d<\/p>\n

He hopes he\u2019ll get the chance to make films in Hungary again. For now, though, Hen stands as a testament to the triumph of creativity over oppression. The film\u2019s heroine offers a powerful commentary on our times, too. \u201cWhen we considered the difference between animals and humans, we concluded that humans have the possibility to make moral decisions. But when someone makes this moral decision, according to the Greek tragedies, it\u2019s too late. Although Giorgos gave his life to a mafia, he can take it back \u2013 but he will get his punishment.\u201d<\/p>\n

This one fictional Greek restaurateur stands for all people who embrace brutal populist regimes \u2013 Americans, perhaps, as well as Hungarians. \u201cWe gave away our rights to a mafia,\u201d says P\u00e1lfi. \u201cNow the big question is, \u2018Can we get them back?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Hen is out in the UK on 22 May<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If oppressive regimes inadvertently give rise to striking artistic works of resistance, then Hen might just be a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":653102,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[49,48,75,337],"class_list":["post-653101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=653101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653101\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/653102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=653101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=653101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=653101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}