Few films can aspire to the irreverent playfulness of Kirsten Johnson’s Dick Johnson is Dead, a heart-stirring meditation on life that doubles as a reeling, rollicking act of love to her father, whose very real dementia inspired Kirsten to stage his multiple fake deaths and funeral. Clearly, reality is not always what it seems with Kirsten, and subversive humour is a way for her to speak truth and deal with the odds. A trait she shares with noted Hungarian writer-director and Berlinale Talents Script Station veteran mentor Gyula Gazdag, whose films have been banned for different periods during Communism and even afterwards. In this lively, thought-provoking chat, Kirsten and Gyula recall the conversations they had around the time of working on Dick Johnson is Dead and let us share in their approach to writing, their penchant for the absurd and empathy for the all-too-human paradoxes that make us laugh when we should be crying.
