Before Dawn

Before Dawn is a short Hungarian film about illegal immigration and refuges. It was direct by Balint Kenyeres in 2005. It was nominated for a Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 2005.

This short film is powerful more so because of what it does not do rather than what it does do. It leaves out all dialogue, has no soundtrack leaving the noises to be only natural (birds) or necessary (the truck horn) ones, it also laves out any real sense of a main character or figure. This detachment is to let the audience be more objective about their point of view on illegal immigration, if the film established a main character on either side of the issue than it would be making more of an argument via the intended emotional attachments it would have made the audience feel to a particular character or cause, where as not having a main character lets the audience see both sides (that these people give up near everything for a chance to go somewhere else) and the governmental side (which is that there are rules that have to be followed in order to leave, and these rules are meant for everyone’s protection). This short film is also shot in just one long take which furthers the detachment stance as it leaves the audience to decide which bits to focus more on rather than being told by the cinematographer.

However at the end there is one man who is left in the grass after everyone else is removed from the area. It is unknown if he somehow missed the truck and lost his family, or if he he was a mole that alerted the authorities to this location and is just dressed to blend in. The ambiguity of this person also lets the audience decide which side was right, since if he was an immigrant is shows they still have another chance to go on, and if he was a mole it shows that this problem is being closed down.

The Cinema 16 trailer clip for this short film can be seen below: