The premise alone immediately calls to mind Forbidden Games and Come and See , but Szász honors those groundbreaking efforts by attempting a similar kind of daring, varied representation.
The Notebook was Hungary’s official submission to the Oscars in the foreign-language category, but the film consistently has more in common with a gallery-of-shocks war picture like Elem Klimov’s (far superior) Come And See than the Holocaust tearjerkers that typically catch the Academy’s attention.