DRIFTER

Richárd “Ricsi” Steinbach is one of those lucky breaks that documentary filmmakers can get when selecting their protagonists. The phase in the life of the eighteen-year-old that the camera captures is the essence of a coming-of-age story, that reads like social tragedy when summarized – broken home, school dropout, wrong friends, petty crime, continually skirting the edge of the abyss. It’s Ricsi himself though who never allows the story to slide into bleakness. Because he behaves like a child whose preoccupied playing is not troubled by a single thought of the consequences of his own actions, he stumbles from one dodgy situation to the next. But one forgives this kid for his mistakes, since in those moments he is blissfully unaware of his guilt, to our own envy, and because he is as such so prototypically human. One wants to protect him, rooting for him on his way to realising his big dream of racing cars, which he draws closer to bolt by bolt. The learning process on the path to becoming a responsible adult that is documented along the way is a bonus.

The German-Hungarian co-production won the award for best documentary debut at the IDFA in 2014.