The Turin Horse

The film's opening narration recounts the apocryphal story of Friedrich Nietzsche witnessing a horse being whipped in Turin, Italy in 1889, after which he reportedly collapsed and never regained his sanity. Director Béla Tarr and co-director Ágnes Hranitzsky then imagine the days following that event from the perspective of the horse's owner. The film asks what happened to that horse and the man who drove it.

The Turin Horse is composed of only 30 long takes across its roughly two-and-a-half-hour runtime, a hallmark of Béla Tarr's minimalist filmmaking style. Many individual shots last several minutes, with sweeping camera movements that circle the characters and their desolate landscape. This technique creates an immersive, meditative rhythm that emphasizes the grinding repetition of daily survival.

Yes, Béla Tarr publicly declared The Turin Horse to be his final feature film, and he has maintained that position since its 2011 premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival, where it won the Silver Bear Jury Grand Prix. He has since focused on teaching and mentoring at film programs rather than directing. The film stands as the capstone of a career that included earlier acclaimed works like Sátántangó and Werckmeister Harmonies.

The film is shot in black and white with a stark, nearly monochromatic palette dominated by wind-blasted landscapes and dim interiors. The imagery draws frequent comparisons to Samuel Beckett's existential bleakness, as the characters' world gradually loses light, water, and food over six days with no explanation. The sound design of the constant wind is as much a character as the people on screen.