Police, Adjective: Grade A

A

Police, Adjective (2009)
Dragos Bucur; Writer & Director Corneliu Porumboiu. (Romanian, subtitled)

A police detective (Bucur) in a small town in Romania tracks a teenager who occasionally smokes pot, hoping to find his supplier. Actually, he does not hope that because he thinks the whole investigation is stupid, but he has been assigned to the case by the police chief. He reminds the chief that nobody in Europe gets busted for smoking a joint but the chief tells him that it is the law, and asks him, “Are you above the law?” The theme of the movie is really not about drugs, but about morality, the nature of authoritarian power, the tedium of everyday life, and Romanian politics. (Consider examples of how the word "police" is used as an adjective, to appreciate the subtlety of the political commentary). In illuminating these values, it succeeds completely.

It also succeeds as a masterpiece of cinematography. Every shot is visually perfect, even though it is obvious in many scenes that a building has been painted a certain way for the shot or a post has been whitewashed to bring brightness to the drab, wet, autumnal scene. The camera often lingers, unmoving for long minutes, so we can absorb the stillness of time in that town, in that country, in that character’s life. Several interior shots are through doorways and having the shot framed by the door jamb gives a startling sense of intimacy.

Caution, however: This not an American style film. It is extremely slow, even by European standards, and absolutely nothing happens. There are no guns, no car chases, no naked women, no drug deals, no violence of any kind. There is nothing going on but a detective walking the grubby streets, smoking, talking in the office. The beauty and the mastery of the picture is entirely “inner.” If you are not an inner person, there is nothing here for you. But if you liked Porumboiu’s 12:08 East of Bucharest (2006), you’ll understand what this one is about.

4 months, 3 weeks, and 2 days: Grade A

A
4 months, 3 weeks, and 2 days (2007) (Romanian, Subtitled)
Anamaria Marinca, Laura Vasiliu. Writer-director Cristian Mungiu.

In Romania, just before the fall of communism, a college student (Vasiliu), needs an illegal abortion. Her roommate and friend (Marinca) helps her through the whole process, which is completed successfully. At one level then, it is a story of friendship, in which the implicit understanding of what it means to be a woman, especially in this environment, pulls the women through almost unimaginable stress.

Is it a pro-choice statement? An abortion does take place, but the extremely bleak environment, the unblinking anti-sentimentalism of the cinematography, emotionally honest dialog, and difficult consequences of the story make me wonder if it is. It could as well be an anti-abortion message. I’d say it is neutral on that dichotomy. I don’t think that was the issue being addressed.

It is also about Romania under communism. The bare winter trees and slushy roads describe the cultural climate, while the scenes of making hotel reservations convey the stifling bureaucracy perfectly, and we feel the background of paranoia that permeates everybody’s life. The movie succeeds on that level as well.

But at it’s core, the story focuses on the conflict between the roommate’s (or any woman’s) socially defined personality, and the biological facticity of reproduction. For these women, conception is a biological punishment for the social act of sex, but in a horrific scene, we also see that the social value of sex can be used to regain control of the body. This conflict between a woman’s biology and personality is the driver of the story, all the more remarkable for it having been written and directed by a man.

Brilliant cinematography, directing, acting, and editing tell the story as well as the dialog. The roommate has dinner with her boyfriend’s parents, where there is joking, singing, story-telling, and wine, in a warm, brightly-lit atmosphere of educated people surrounded by books and laughter. In the next scene, in a stark hotel, the quack doctor negotiates his price. Then it is the harsh reality of the procedure. We are, with the protagonist, plunged from the socially constructed world of the dinner party, ten stories down a chute to the biological foundation of reproduction, with such suddenness that we are disoriented, as are the two women. In the final scene, the women sip water in the hotel restaurant, waiting for the only food left on the late-night menu. They can hardly speak to each other, they are so stunned by what has happened. The waiter brings the food, what was served at the concurrent wedding party: cooked brains, liver, and marrow, a healthy, high protein meal, no doubt. The dish is pushed aside without a word.

12:08 East of Bucharest: Grade A

A
12:08 East of Bucharest (2006)
Mircea Andreescu, Teodor Corban, Ion Sapdaru. Writer-Director Corneliu Porumboiu. Romanian (subtitled).

It seems clear that this film was made for domestic consumption in Romania. It’s hard to imagine it would appeal to an American audience, yet inexplicably, I enjoyed it tremendously. In a contemporary provincial town, a dreary television talk show interviews two locals, asking them where they were and what they were doing on that fateful day in 1989 when communism fell in Romania and dictator Ceausescu fled. The two men interviewed say they were out in the town square protesting the government and calling for its overthrow. But the interviewer presses them for details: were they protesting before 12:08 pm when the dictator fled, or were they celebrating after that time, when it was safe? In other words, were they really part of the revolution or just observers of it? The style of the questions and answers start to take the shape of an interrogation by the secret police, focusing obsessively on tiny details. The interviewees get defensive, angry, depressed, and defeated. In the background is a lifeless flat mural of the empty, barren town square in front of a concrete hulk of a government building. There are comments about whether the clock in the tower ever was accurate, a fine metaphor for life under communism. Callers-in to the show are hostile, dismissive, or contradicting of the interviewees. One claims life was better before the revolution. One is now a rich factory owner, but formerly was with the secret police, as the interviewees well know. He intimidates the interviewer about “libelous claims.” We start to understand the larger question of whether there really was a revolution at all for the ordinary people. What is different now? They still struggle to pay their debts and put bread on the table. It is a rich metaphorical film, reminiscent of a story by George Orwell, and one senses that it still touches raw nerves in Romania today. It also gives a rare look into provincial life there. I give the movie an ‘A’ because I enjoyed it so much, but it is so subtle that I wouldn’t recommend it to the average American movie watcher.