Béla Tarr, the Hungarian filmmaker whose austere, time-defying works reshaped modern art cinema, has died at the age of 70.
The European Film Academy, of which Tarr had been a member since 1997, confirmed his death on Tuesday, saying he passed away after a long illness. In a statement, the academy hailed him as "an outstanding director and a personality with a strong political voice," revered by colleagues and audiences worldwide. The family has requested privacy.
Tarr was a defining force behind what later came to be known as slow cinema—a rigorous style marked by long, uninterrupted takes, stark black-and-white imagery, sparse dialogue and a deliberate rejection of conventional narrative rhythm. His films demanded patience, but rewarded it with an unflinching gaze at power, despair and moral decay.
That approach reached its most radical expression in "Sátántangó" (1994), a seven-and-a-half-hour epic adapted from László Krasznahorkai's novel. Set in a collapsing Hungarian village after the fall of communism, the film charts collective disillusionment and social paralysis. Against all expectations, it became one of Tarr's most celebrated works and is now widely regarded as one of the greatest films ever made.
Born on July 21, 1955, in Pécs, Hungary, Tarr began making films as a teenager. His early work drew the attention of Béla Balázs Studio, which supported his debut feature, "Family Nest" (1979), a raw social realist portrait of working-class life. He later studied at the Academy of Theatre and Film in Budapest, graduating in 1982.
His early films—"The Outsider" (1981), "The Prefab People" (1982) and "Almanac of Fall" (1984)—were grounded in realism. A decisive stylistic shift came with "Damnation" (1988), Hungary's first independent feature film, which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival and announced Tarr's signature visual language: controlled camera movement, bleak landscapes and existential weight.
Tarr's mature period included "Werckmeister Harmonies" (2000), co-directed and edited with his wife and longtime collaborator Ágnes Hranitzky. Composed of just 39 shots, the film unfolds amid mounting political dread as a mysterious circus arrives in a provincial town. It remains one of his most influential works.
Later films included "The Man From London" (2007), starring Tilda Swinton, which premiered at Cannes, and "The Turin Horse" (2011), a stark meditation inspired by Friedrich Nietzsche's collapse. The latter won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize at the Berlin Film Festival. Tarr announced it would be his final film.
After stepping away from filmmaking, Tarr devoted himself to teaching. In 2012, he founded the Film.Factory school in Sarajevo, mentoring young filmmakers and inviting figures such as Tilda Swinton, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Carlos Reygadas, Pedro Costa, Gus Van Sant, Juliette Binoche and Jacques Rancière to teach there.
