1.  The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (Moartea domnului Lăzărescu)

Year: 2005
Director: Cristi Puiu
"Dante Remus Lăzărescu":  Ioan Fiscuteanu
"Mioara":  Luminiţa Gheorghiu

I had wished to see this movie for quite a long time.  Billed as a "black comedy" (check) featuring some cats (check) on a stretcher on the poster, and winning a prize at Cannes and widespread critical acclaim (check), it seemed terribly appealing.  

The Plot
An elderly man, Dante Remus Lăzărescu, who has a bit of a drinking habit, falls ill and is eventually taken to the hospital.  And is eventually taken to the next hospital.  And is eventually taken to the next hospital.  You get the picture.  This is not a conventional plot arc with 3 acts, exposition, climax and denouement.  The plot is driven by the suspense created as the patient's condition and probability of getting treated deteriorate over a period of abut 8 hours.  As the paramedics go from one hospital to the next to have him treated, the same basic scene is repeated, and the absurdity of his situation intensifies.  Perhaps it is comic.  I'm sticking to "absurd."  Comedy implies some intentionality.  It also implies some artifice.  What strikes me most about this film is the cold realism.  You can call it a "dark comedy" if you like.  If you think Kafka's The Trial is dark comedy.  Of course, you'd be wrong, but don't let that stop you.

The Health care System
It is difficult, as an American, to talk about this film without broaching the subject of our own health care system.  Especially since I've been going through a similar situation with my brother, on a more epic scale.  In some aspects, the problems are the same: overcrowding, incompetence, bureaucracy, long waits, people with shocking attitude problems, professionals who dismiss the complaints of patients, the treatment of patients as units of production rather than human beings.  The difference between the American and Romanian systems, however, is that the character in the film was denied treatment for just about every imaginable reason except his ability to pay.  OTOH, most American hospitals have an emergency triage protocol that did not appear to be in place in Romania.  BTW, this was based on a true story.  But the message is not explicitly political.  It's an indictment of humans, not policy.

The Love Story
According to the director, this is the first installment in a series of "love" stories.  The theme of The Death of Mr. Lazarescu is "love of one's fellow man."  And I suppose, how it materializes, or moreover, does not.  It is precisely about how people avoid this responsibility, supposedly "human nature," in the little choices they make, and the cumulative effect such choices have on our fellow humans.  Is love of one's fellow man just a pretty story we tell ourselves?  Is it really in our nature to acknowledge the humanity of others?  

Personal observations
It's full of references, starting with the name of main character, Dante Remus Lazarescu.  You can make yourself feel smart by catching them.  

If you are a hypochondriac (which apparently the director is), I hesitantly recommend this film.  I think it is worth seeing.  But if you are like me, and think every little ache is probably cancer and you faint at the sight of needles, just ... be prepared.  I woke up from a nightmare in which I had hepatitis after I saw this.  Don't say I didn't warn you.

If you are a junkie for Eastern European (or Mediterranean countries with Eastern European mentalities) kitsch, you will cherish this film.  I mean, for all that Romanian student's protests to the contrary, modern Bucharest smacks of post-Communist Eastern Europe ethos.  Same dank concrete apartment buildings.  Same drinking issues.  Same neighbors who hate your cats and worry you're not eating right.  Same depressing color palate no human being with the gift of eyesight could ever wrestle joy from.  Same bureaucracy that you suspect is intentional for the entertainment of higher ups.  Same cats.  Same never being able to go a day without being reminded of your own mortality.  Same waiting for ambulances that never come.  Same washing machine located in the kitchen of all places.  Same dimly lit emergency rooms.  Same beautiful women and same cocky men.  Same profound absurdity of daily life.  And the same peculiar brand of humanity and queer charm - despite it all.  

Some people argue it is too long.  But its length certainly functions as a dramatic device.  In the 60's there was "smell-o-vision."  Puiu has brought us "wait-o-vision."  But don't get the wrong idea - it's hardly boring!  And perhaps it even deserves some kind of special mention for "most brilliant use of a title in a film."

2.  4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (4 luni, 3 săptămâni şi 2 zile)

Year:  2007
Director:  Cristian Mungiu.
"Otilia Mihartescu":  Anamaria Marinca
"Gabriela 'Găbiţa' Dragut":  Laura Vasiliu  

The Plot
Set in Communist Romania, a university student helps her friend try to obtain an abortion, which was illegal at the time.  

Personal observations
You can check your "pro-choice" and "pro-life" positions at the door, because this film is not about red States and blue States.  It's about bravery, desperation, friendship, sacrifice, and the lengths we will go to when backed into a corner.  It's not sentimental or pedantic.  It's a rough, suspenseful ride.  Hold on tight.

I saw this a while ago, and briefly mentioned it in the OT.

I saw 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days last night.  Has anyone else seen this?  It is very very good storytelling, but I'm hesitant to recommend it only because it is very very hard to watch.  I don't think I will forget it anytime soon...

BTW, there are only like 50 movie theatres in Romania.  Whew knew?

"This is nothing compared to how Putin rigged Eurovision."

by poemless on Mon Jun 30th, 2008 at 04:37:28 PM EST
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I haven't heard of that film yet. And I didn't know about the cinema shortage in Romania - I looked around a bit, and while numbers vary across sources from 48 to 80, it's baffling - and no explanation is given anywhere. Even considering that cinema chains barely began to build multiplexes.

Traitor, n.
A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.

by DoDo on Mon Jun 30th, 2008 at 05:03:41 PM EST
_____

There was a bit about that in the extra features on the dvd.  It wasn't clear precisely what had happened, but what I caught was that after communism, the movie theatres and land they were on were bought up (grabbed?)  for other, more profitable commercial use.  It also seems that the same kind of chaos and disintegration of the industry as a result of the collapse of the State which had been supporting the industry had a lot to do with it (a la the Russia scenario.)  At one point there were only 30-something operating movie theatres in Romania.  So when this film came out, they hired these Germans to drive around the country and set up impromptu screenings, outdoors, in abandoned theaters, etc.  

It won the Palme d'Or.  I'm surprised you've not heard of it.

Anyway, Romania is supposed to be the new It country for great films.  Everyone's sweethearts....

"This is nothing compared to how Putin rigged Eurovision."

by poemless on Mon Jun 30th, 2008 at 05:14:43 PM EST
_____

So Romania's must be a more extreme version of what happened across the region. Say in Budapest, all but a dozen of the c. 70 old movie theatres have been closed - though the last few already when the dozen or so multiplexes were built. Now to come to the Palme d'Or question: winners usually go straight in art theatres here, but since I moved away from Budapest, I seldom get to see art films (bad schedule from my viewpoint).

Traitor, n.
A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
by DoDo on Mon Jun 30th, 2008 at 05:41:00 PM EST

Why are you writing this diary?

I felt I needed to write this diary because of the many parallels I found between these films in quality, style, subject and sensibility.  The frustrating attempts to obtain a medical procedure.  The bureaucratic and obstacles around every corner.  The suspense as the direness of the situation becomes apparent.   The matter of mundane lives and deaths of people whose moral responsibility we are want to question yet nevertheless implicating us while we remain helpless observers.  The realism, reminiscent of Italian Neo-realism and Czech New-wave.  The drama of the banal and social critiques while somehow managing to be unbelievably engaging.  These are the kinds of movies that make you want to get up and do something to save the characters.  They illustrate our underestimated capacities for both victimization and determination.  The four main characters in these two films succeed in exposing the very best and the very worst in people, the small acts of empathy and evil which take place everyday in unremarkable settings with unremarkable people, the sum of which we nonchalantly refer to as "life" or "society".  

Also, both directors talk of the constraints of making films in a country which has no film industry, and in 2007, had only 50 movie theatres.  

And they both feature some very similar ugly floral plastic table cloths, which I suppose must be common in Romania.  

Of course it is perverse to base one's entire understanding of anything at all on two little movies.  But I see something notable here!  Ok?  Wikipedia is calling this the "Romanian New Wave."  I don't know why every new national film movement has to be called the "new wave" as though the only thing which differentiates them are their countries of origin, or as if film were an implicitly aquatic medium.  I am going to go out on a limb here and invent a new theory again.  

My Brilliant Theory:  Inverted Socialist Realism

There is something which unites these films, something beyond the unpleasant medical procedures and unpleasant table cloths.  I am going to call it "Inverted Socialist Realism."  Socialist Realism was the official aesthetic of the Soviet Union under Stalin.  The stated objective was to present typical people and events in a "realistic" (meaning, not formalist) way which promoted all the glory and achievement of Communism.  Er, so if that sounds oxymoronic, it was.  And the net effect was creepy.  But, oddly, trying to come up with some labels to slap on these Romanian films, "Social" and "Realism" kept hounding me.  Ironic, don't you think?  Maybe not.  It also kind of makes perfect sense if you give it a few minutes' thought.  What we see now is what we would have seen in Socialist Realism had it actually been allowed to be either of those things.  Instead of rejecting the ideas of the past, they've co-opted them!  Mind you, I'm not arguing this is being done consciously or anything...  

One thing that strikes me about these two films is that they are so incredibly mature.  That may be in part due to the lack of commercial or governmental pressure.  They do not simply reject outdated ideologies by embracing new ones, as we saw in Russian film.  For example, while 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days exposes all of the dangers of illegal abortions and the frustrations of Communist bureaucracy, it holds the individual equally, or even more culpable as society, or the government.  The bureaucracy and insensitivity in The Death of Mr. Lazarescu takes place in contemporary Romania, and it is even suggested that suffering has been exacerbated by modern developments like emigration and reckless society. Yet again, it is not an indictment of a system, but the choices of individuals within it.  The sum of its parts.  

Even though 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days is set in Communist era, while The Death of Mr. Lazarescu is contemporary, both films concentrate on the stories of a couple of individuals, which has the ironic the effect of highlighting the bonds humans do have, either as friends, or as our brothers' keepers.  There is also a latent condemnation of a society which lacks empathy and responsibility.  Where Soviet films championed the society over the individual, and American films champion the individual over society, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and The Death of Mr. Lazarescu accept that the two are inextricably linked.  Society is the sum of its parts, again.

Nor do these movies dwell on identity or politics or other divisive themes we would expect from other "post-Communist" countries.  There's no attempt to promote a explicitly modern, uniquely "Romanian", Western, democratic, optimistic Romania.  In the US, any film about people being denied health care or abortions would be "political" because the default position for movies here is "don't talk about anything that would be a bummer, dude.  There's no money in that."  In Russia, these films would be political because the default position for movies is "everything you say and do is a reflection of our country.  Ignoring that opinion is even a reflection of our country.  And we can withhold your funding."  But in their own context, these movies feel apolitical.  Because there is no industry agenda to subvert.  

Again, the filmmakers choose to show things as they are, not how they "should" be.  In purely visual sense, the Romania presented in both films is quintessentially ... Soviet.  And I don't mean bouquet of red carnations and golden fields of wheat.  When I switched over to CFL bulbs a while back, my step-father remarked that now my apartment would look like, and I quote, "a Soviet kitchen from the 1960's."  As if I weren't going for that anyway...  My point: these movies are striking for their dimness.  Dimly lit rooms in hotels and apartments decorated in impossible shades of ochre.  Dimly lit bathrooms and emergency rooms tiled a shade of grey-green smacked with fluorescent lighting.  Unlit apartment building stairwells.  In fact, both films take place mostly at night.  Given that both stories deal with grim events, it's appropriate that their aesthetics reflect that.  But it doesn't feel deliberate, like in the movie The Lives of Others, which explicitly uses a palate as a metaphor, a gimmick, a political statement.  Nor is there some an attempt to market this grimness in the kitchy package of Ostalgia.  The aesthetic simply underlines the realism of the stories, the absence of metaphors and gimmicks and mythologies.

So I think these films, this "movement", if it exists, exemplifies a social realism stripped of the bullshit which defined the Communist era, without completely condemning or denying the legacies of that era. They are not feel-good, escapist movies.  They are not political movies. They are the horror films and love stories of reality.  Which we might have more appreciation for if we bothered to look directly at it more often.

The Romanian New Wave

From Wikipedia:

Some critics have expressed doubt as to whether there is a unifying theme to the Romanian New Wave.

Pshaw!  Some critics just are not as sharp as I am.  Or some critics have too much integrity and cowardice to base a whole entire theory on two films.  Clearly.

Ok.  I hope you found this diary worthwhile.

I'll open the comments for your own intellectual posturing and movie recommendations!