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During the night of Dec. 22-23, 1989, mere hours after the fall of Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, a squad of confused militia men navigates the chaotic streets of Bucharest rife with warring factions in “The Paper Will Be Blue.” Third feature by helmer Radu Muntean (“The Fury”) adeptly blends docudrama realism and wryly observed humor in a manner comparable to fellow Romanian Cristi Puiu’s recent “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu” and other local films, while offering yet another intimate-scaled, off-center examination of the impact of 1989. Adventurous distribs may care to sign on “Paper” for niche release and possible TV sales.

Opening day lit scene shows a group of soldiers and apparently one civilian coming out of an armored car for a cigarette break, only to be suddenly gunned down by unseen assailants. Rest of pic unfolds the night before, so that the context of the scene and who exactly has been shot is only clear at the end, adding an extra chill to the often humorous proceedings of film’s bulk.

On Dec. 22, Romanian leader Ceausescu is overthrown by a combination of general insurrection and military coup, and no one is quite sure who is running the country. An armored squad car unit of militia (national police) soldiers under the command of Lt. Neagu (experienced legit thesp Adi Carauleanu) is assigned to keep the peace in a fairly quiet Bucharest suburb. Over their often malfunctioning radio, they hear that the army, siding with the anti-Ceausescu populace, has taken control of the national TV station, but reports come in that pro-Ceausescu “terrorists” are trying to siege control of the station back.

Young militiaman Costi (cheeky newcomer Paul Ipate), who has secured his coveted Bucharest posting near his family due to his doctor father’s connections, argues with his fellow soldiers and Neagu that they should go help defend the TV station. When a crowd distracts the unit’s attention, Costi runs off to join anti-Ceausescu supporters headed toward the station.

However, he gets waylaid at a suburban house run by paranoid protestors, where he’s at first called on to help defend the house against “terrorists” and then suddenly accused of being one himself and arrested.

While Costi struggles to convince his captors of his democratic beliefs, Lt. Neagu, petrified he will get into trouble for Costi’s desertion, takes the squad to go look for him. They end up at Costi’s house where his anxious mother (Dana Dogaru) and g.f. (Ana Ularu) are constantly watching the rolling footage from the national station (real archive material broadcast at the time).

Helmer Muntean and his co-screenwriters Razvan Radulescu and Alexandru Baciu adroitly play off the threat of real violence (as promised in opening scene) against the comic absurdity of the what’s going on, for instance when Costi finally persuades his captors to let him go by getting his mother on the phone to vouch for his character.

Characters, who are hard to tell apart at first given grainy, umbral quality of high-def night shoot, gradually blossom into likeable, fully formed personalities.

Using largely handheld camera rigs and overlapping sound, pic achieves high degree of naturalism, creating docudrama feel without ever edging into preachiness. Accent is on showing confusion of the times from regular folks point of view, not making a big statement about history in the larger sense.

Radu Muntean - (2006) The Paper Will Be Blue.mkv

General
Container:  	Matroska
Runtime: 	1h 35mn
Size: 	1.46 GiB
Video
Codec: 	x264
Resolution: 	720x552 ~> 1021x552
Aspect ratio:  	1.85:1
Frame rate: 	24.000 fps
Bit rate: 	2 000 Kbps
BPP: 	0.210
Audio
#1:  	2.0ch AC-3 @ 192 Kbps

https://nitro.download/view/A53BCFDB47C5AB2/Radu_Muntean_-_(2006)_The_Paper_Will_Be_Blue.mkv

Language(s):Romanian
Subtitles:English

The post Radu Muntean – Hîrtia va fi albastrã AKA The Paper Will Be Blue (2006) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

Alice, a buoyant and impertinent redhead teenager, is far from the charming little girl her mother adopted when she was unable to have a child of her own. Being an endless source of problems and affected by her mother’s disappointments, Alice forges lies and blurs the lines between the fiction she creates for herself and the reality of her existence. Until her mother discovers she is pregnant.

3.14GB | 1 h 45 min | 1920×1080 | mkv

https://nitro.download/view/BB4680D3C90A438/Alice.T.2018.1080p.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H264-CMYK.mkv

Language:Romanian
Subtitles:Spanish

The post Radu Muntean – Alice T. (2018) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

A ‘generation film’ about 30-somethings in Romania who deal with totally different issues than those of their parents. The businessman Bogdan (alias Boogie) is on a holiday with his family at the Black Sea and bumps into two old friends with whom he hopes to re-live the good old days.

2.23GB | 1h 42mn | 1024×554 | mkv

https://nitro.download/view/F3A55DDB03BFF12/Boogie.AKA.Summer.Holiday.2008.DVD.AC3.5.1.x264-SaL.mkv

Language:Romanian
Subtitles:English, French

The post Radu Muntean – Boogie AKA Summer Holiday (2008) first appeared on Cinema of the World.

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“Tuesday, After Christmas” (Marti, dupa craciun, 2010) is the latest film from Romania to hit the film festival circuit and cause a stir. I saw it at this year’s Chicago International Film Festival.

A great many of the films coming from Romania have all been fiercely political. There was “12:08 East of Bucharest” (A Fost sau n-a fost, 2007), “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” (4 luni, 3 saptamani si 2 zile, 2007), “How I Spent The End of the World” (Cum mi-am petrecut sfarsitul lumii, 2006) and the movie which started this recent “new wave” in Romanian cinema “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu” (Moartea domnului Lazarescu, 2006). But “Tuesday, After Christmas” is much different. There is absolutely no mention of politics or even social injustice.

The film follows Paul Hanganu (Mimi Branescu) who is married to Adriana (Mirela Oprisor, whom some may recognize from Francis Ford Coppola’s “Youth Without Youth” (2007), they have a daughter as well. But what is not known is Paul has been having an affair with Raluca (Maria Popistasu). The rest of the film addresses Paul’s dilemma in having to make a choice. He simply cannot go on leading two lives.

Some of the buzz at the film festival concerning this film has been that it is very slow and nothing happens. I heard remarks like this even from the people who liked the movie. Those that didn’t like the movie told me they kept waiting for something to happen. I’m not exactly sure what these audience members were expecting though that wasn’t the impression I was left with watching this film.

If by “nothing ever happens” people mean there are no explosions, fight scenes and alien battles, then, yes, they are correct. But the movie is filled with emotion. In fact I have rarely seen a movie as emotionally sincere as this. We understand Paul’s predictiment. We understand what consequences his choice will have on the women in his life. There is no easy answer. I personally found that element of the film gripping. What exactly will Paul do?

The film was directed by Radu Muntean. He is one of the new faces in Romanian cinema. He directed “The Paper Will Be Blue” (2006) a film about the Romanian Revolution. It also played at the Chicago International Film Festival and unfortunately never found distribution in this country. Here though Muntean displays a true understanding for how to capture people at their most vulnerable. After Paul makes his decision I felt a certain awkwardness in the scenes which followed. He is able to capture the uneasiness within the characters and the situation.

The performances are flawless. I wouldn’t change one thing about this film. Everyone comes off as natural. Each performance is believeable. We can see ourselves in these characters. Everyone reacts to situations in a realistic manner. Nothing is overdone and overblown here for dramatic license. This is life.

With the current interest in Romanian cinema I can only hope the film finds distribution in this country. I have a good feeling it will. “Tuesday, After Christmas” is a film not to be missed. The cinematography is rather simple but emotionally it is complex. The film is nothing short of brilliant.

Alex Udvary @ Blog

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Over the last four years, filmmakers from the small Eastern European nation have swept into the south of France every May and put far bigger, more storied film cultures to shame, the U.S. and the fiercely proud host country among them. It started primarily with the critics’ favorite “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu” in 2006, continued the following year with the powerful abortion drama “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” (which won the Palme d’Or) and hasn’t abated since, with last year’s “Police, Adjective” and “Tales from the Golden Age” worthy entries in the so-called Romanian New Wave.

This year the streak continues — and perhaps gets even stronger — with “Tuesday, After Christmas,” an infidelity drama from a director named Radu Muntean who’s been here several times before. We caught his new movie, in the festival’s Un Certain Regard section, at its Thursday press screening and were close to blown away. Muntean’s movie is a remarkable, pitch-perfect work, as convincing and affecting a portrayal of the subtleties of modern life and marriage as you’ll find on the screen.

The film is peopled by little more than a married, 40-ish man named Cristi (Mimi Branescu) who’s having an affair, his serious but not unsympathetic wife, their preteen daughter and the daughter’s orthodontist, with whom Cristi is engaging in said extra-martial activity. Things get hairy from the start for Cristi, as he’s consumed by guilt (not to mention logistical issues) in his attempts to keep the affair a secret, then get emotionally complicated as he juggles his feelings and relationships with the two women (as well as his daughter).

It all sounds very ordinary, or even pedestrian, by art-house film standards. But if cinematic genius is taking a story we think we’ve seen before and telling it an entirely fresh way, Muntean is ready for Mensa. There are no melodramatic hysterics of the kind you’d see in the U.S. “Terms of Endearment”-esque version of the tale; even the movie’s climactic showdown feels wonderfully restrained. It’s simply absorbing, authentic storytelling, with filmmaking that’s distinctly stylized but never distracting. And the performances are insanely good.

Steven Zeitchik @ LA Times

1.12GB | 1:35:59 | 720×304 | avi
http://nitroflare.com/view/3A826398C818025/Marti.dupa.Craciun.2010.part1.rar
http://nitroflare.com/view/C61A742FCE336E9/Marti.dupa.Craciun.2010.part2.rar

Language(s):Romanian
Subtitles:English

The post Radu Muntean – Marti, dupa craciun aka Tuesday, After Christmas (2010) first appeared on Cinema of the World.