I’m not what you’d call a film expert, for most of what I view is mindless stuff, possibly ridden with explosions and usually on planes; documentaries and short fiction are more to my liking. However, every now and then I happen to stumble upon a film that just captures my imagination, even without explosions or lines such as “Yippi ki yay, motherfucker”.

Kontroll is one such film. Directed by a young filmmaker, Nimród Antal, it’s shot entirely indoors and entirely inside the slightly dystopian universe of Budapest’s underground: not in the old, cute environs of Line 1 or in the glitzy surroundings of the newly opened Line 4 but in the deep recesses of Line 3 and 4, with their old Soviet rolling stock, decor chosen by someone affected by colour blindness and delightfully old fashioned looks. It’s the story of a band of scruffy, rag-tag ticket inspectors and of the epic fight that one of them, Bulcsú, takes on against the evil inside him. I saw the movie many times and, albeit the philosophical aspect of the whole thing escaped me for the first few takes, I immediately fell in love with the characters, the deep irony permeating many episodes and the great acting. But, mainly, with Budapest’s metro.

Here are three photos that I’ve taken during my last ride on Lines 2 and 3 of BP’s metro this March.