After a gap of nearly two decades, Nóra Lakos’s work takes on a role in the visual education of children with a truly heartwarming Hungarian family film. The visuals of the film I Accidentally Wrote a Book were primarily inspired by Bauhaus: the colors and shapes of Bauhaus are very characteristic, and both the visuals and the costumes and props were inspired by it. The visuals of this year’s family film are the work of production designer Juci Szurdi, costume designer Fruzsina Lányi, creative animation director Péter Bátory and set designer Zsuzsa Mihalek, Oscar-winner.

The film was awarded the best film award at the northernmost A-category film festival, Tallinn Black Nights, and in the competition for films for young audiences, the film’s protagonist, Demeter Villő, was awarded the prestigious Ale Kino! festival Ale Debut!, returned home from Poland with the award for best young European talent. At this year’s 44th Hungarian Film Festival, the film I Accidentally Wrote a Book was recognized by the jury with a special award among feature films.

The visuals of I Accidentally Wrote a Book were primarily inspired by the Bauhaus. “When, after several months of location searching, we found the main location of the story, which is a beautiful Bauhaus family house, we realized that everything had to revolve around it. The colors and shapes of Bauhaus are very characteristic, and this is reflected in both the visual design and the costumes and props. Bauhaus is both down-to-earth and has a certain elemental playfulness to it, and this is exactly true of our story, so the form and content meet perfectly” – said Nóra Lakos about the choice. “In every film, I place great emphasis on creating a unique visual world, and with I Wrote a Book this was particularly important, as the expectations of the young audience in this area are very high.” 

Bauhaus emerged from the famous German architectural and art school of the same name in the 1920s. The trend, which became a movement, developed a unified visual language characterized by puritanical simplicity, geometric shapes and a strong use of color – its typical colors are red, yellow, blue, black and white in addition to the basic colors.

The crew filmed in nearly thirty different locations, including one of the most unique places in Budapest, the Bauhaus model housing estate on Napraforgó Street. They filmed for four days at the Ikarus athletics track, then on Lupa Island, in a studio apartment on Gellért Hill, in downtown cafes, and on a huge ship on the most beautiful shores of Lake Balaton.

“The world of Bauhaus is perhaps as flourishing and diverse as a teenager growing from a girl into a woman. She simultaneously seeks the security of the rules of the already known reality and experiments with playful deconstruction of forms. She is able to stand her ground in new, powerful colors and at the same time hide in line patterns. She dares to create, and then suddenly return to what she already knows. Nina also finds her way along this path, where the worlds around her dance with her” – said production designer Juci Szurdi.

The set design for the film I Accidentally Wrote a Book was done by Zsuzsa Mihalek, who won the Oscar for Best Production Design as the set designer for Poor Couples. “When I found out that Juci Szurdi would be the film’s production designer, I knew that there would be no templates or boring sets. I really like Juci’s imagination, her fresh, youthful vision, we placed great emphasis on selecting every piece of furniture and furnishings. We enjoyed every moment of working together” – said Zsuzsa Mihalek about their collaboration.

“It was clear from the moment I was asked to work that the visual world of the film was very strong and playful, in which the costumes would play a very prominent role. For me, colors are incredibly important – both in my life and in my designs. I am very interested in how far you can go with the power, saturation and combination of colors. Unfortunately, in today’s Western European world, we are afraid of colors, which is why the light and playful world of the film Randomly… was a great gift. When I read the script, the color world of certain characters was quite clear to me. Lídia is reddish, Adél is pastel, and Nina is Bauhaus itself,” said costume designer Fruzsina Lányi.

The creators of the film sincerely believe in the power of writing and that it is an important tool for expressing emotions. Their mission is that by making this film for children and young audiences, they can provide them with tools to express their feelings and overcome difficulties in addition to entertaining them. The book on which the film is based, in addition to being an entertaining coming-of-age story, also introduces the viewer to the most important concepts related to writing. “One of the biggest challenges was visualizing the miracle of writing, for which I chose animation as the main tool when writing the script,” said Nóra Lakos.

Led by creative animation director Péter Báthory, letters were added to the live images, which then came to life in a variety of ways with the help of the Dutch post-production team, giving the film a very special visual world. As emotions change, the writing also changes, so it was possible to convey additional messages by shaping the subtitles. “The graphic and animation world of the film combines the minimalist style of Bauhaus and the playful style of hand-drawn drawings. “All the animations and graphics make it feel like Nina’s notebook came to life,” said Péter Bátory. I Accidentally Wrote a Book was a Dutch co-production, so the lighting, VFX, animations and music in the film were all done in Amsterdam.

Source: press release