András S. Takács

Andras S. Takacs (born in Budapest, Hungary in 1987) was the classmate of Eszter Cseke at the Hungarian Film Academy where Takacs studied television and documentary filmmaking from 2006. Takacs attended a course at the New York Film Academy and spent a semester at the Edinburgh College of Art. Today they are award-winning Hungarian journalists and documentary filmmakers of On the Spot, an acclaimed documentary series in Central Europe. With just two small broadcast cameras and no extra crew, Cseke and Takacs have always gained unique perspectives in the most delicate environments. After a decade of filming across five continents, it is no wonder that their different approach has been called "rare and exclusive" by the BBC. Each year, Takacs has focused on a new and compelling subject for the series. Whether it is living with ethnic tribes in Africa and Papua, being embedded with fighters in the Middle East, getting to know children of dictators or travelling the world and examining birth in a myriad of cultures, On The Spot is a unique player in the field of documentary filmmaking. Over the years, the program has garnered a great deal of international recognition. They received the Golden Nymph for Best Documentary at the 53rd Monte Carlo TV Festival, the Press Freedom Award in Strasbourg from the Council of Europe, the Prize for Best International Short Film at the American Documentary Film Festival and the Gold Plaque at the 50th Chicago International Film Festival Television Awards. The Financial Times wrote On The Spot is "up-close and visceral", adding that "Takacs and Cseke plunge their cameras into the heart of the action, asking questions that are normally suppressed." They take their inspiration from famed Hungarian war correspondent Robert Capa who wrote, "If your pictures aren't good enough, you're not close enough." They did not just listen to Capa. They lived it. Takacs was a member of the Non-Fiction Jury at the 57th Monte Carlo TV Festival just like at BUDOKU Film Festival and at BIDF Budapest International Documentary Festival. In 2015 the creators of On the Spot received the Hungarian Pulitzer Memorial Prize. He has two children called Mozes and Kala who have been to many countries as they travel the world with their documentary filmmaker parents from Sri Lanka to Oman to Krakow. In Krakow their son even happened to grab the cross of Pope Francis after his parents finished filming a scene for their first feature-length film: Born in Auschwitz.