Maria (2013)

Maria is a short (19 minutes) documentary made by Claudiu Mitcu, shot on his smartphone.  Maria is an old woman dying at home, watched over by female family and friends who try to make her comfortable.  When they are not doing that they are chatting to each other in the easy manner people who have known each other a long time have.  They talk about Maria as if she were already dead, eulogising her accomplishments and discussing funeral arrangements.  This might seem astonishingly insensitive, but these are tough women and their compassion is of a practical and unsentimental kind.

Maria is conscious but does not seem distressed by what she hears; it is probably similar to conversations she has had herself while nursing dying relatives.  Mitcu sits unobtrusively in the corner filming, and the behaviour of the women is totally natural.  There is nothing prurient or intrusive as the film feels like a respectful act of love.  We do not follow Maria to the point of death, in fact the film breaks off at an arbitrary point mid-conversation, but that is like life: we enter and leave at arbitrary points, and it goes on without us.

The talk turns to personal matters and one of the ladies worries about who will look after her in old age the way she looks after her parents.  Tines are changing; the participants are enacting an age-old ritual, but in some societies it has become far less common than it used to be.  With sophisticated technology increasingly prevalent as we reach the end of our lives we are in danger of losing the human touch that connects us to each other.  Maria is fortunate.  This is how people should die whenever possible, not in a hospital ward but in your own bed, surrounded by those you love, though perhaps not necessarily such chatty ones as these.

Source: YouTube/Cinepub

Metrobranding (2010)

Subtitled ‘A Love Story Between People and Objects’, Metrobranding is a documentary film directed by Ana Vlad and Adrian Voicu.  It consists of interviews with middle-aged and elderly people reminiscing about the production of goods they helped to manufacture pre-1989, before western-style consumerism hit Romania.  The result of a planned as opposed to a free-market economy, rather than competition for a share of customer spend, Romanians were limited to a single brand for any given product.  To explore this strategy, Metrobranding looks at six particular brands that had monopolies and each of which was produced only in one town: the Ileana sewing Machine, Finca plimsolls, the Mobra motorbike, the Pegas bicycle, the Relaxa mattress, and the Star light bulb.

These were all familiar to the citizens of communist Romania because they were ubiquitous, and this familiarity explains the attachment people still have towards them, emblematic of a vanished era and one evoking nostalgia for many.  Those who were involved in their manufacture look back and see good times for their communities and pride in what they achieved.  They worked hard certainly, but had a sense of purpose.  In a changing world some of the products could not compete, and this is a story of changing tastes and decay more than one of industrial archaeology.  There are many questions raised by the film though little attempt to answer them, but the feeling of loss comes across clearly.

Some of the questions include: Why did old brands fall by the wayside?  Could they not compete with more efficient production methods (the mattress factory is still going, but looks inefficient) or cheap imports?  Does monopoly lead to shoddiness because the market is captive?  Did products simply become unfashionable because of their familiarity, or associations?  Do they have a retro appeal?  What happens to a town reliant on a single commodity when that commodity is no longer viable (one thinks of Detroit here as an example).  When thousands worked in a factory that operated round the clock, what do they do when the factory closes and they lack the skills necessary for other employment?

There is surprisingly little emphasis in the film on the politics which were concerned to build a society that could have its needs met with limited resources, even if much of the output was for export.  This omission is a problem, as decisions about how production should be organised were made centrally, and it is unclear to what extent there is wistfulness for these vanished products rather than for the old political system that authorised them.  Such views were implicit, but not much examined.

Times have changed – school students were sniffy about the plimsolls compared to their trainers even though they looked elegant and well made – but the film does highlight the issue of state planning vs letting the market decide.  We are used to the idea of competition (or at least the notion of competition – there may be cartels at work), but really are we any happier with having massive freedom of choice when it comes to buying a mattress or a light bulb?  Either way, the film has a broader dimension: it may be specifically about a limited range of brands in one country, but it touches on a universal feeling of loss for what is gone, wherever you happen to live and under whatever system of government.

Source: YouTube/Cinepub

On the Footsteps of the Prince

 Kickstarter funding is being sought for a documentary film, On the Footsteps of the Prince, the prince in question being HRH Prince Charles.  He has visited Romania repeatedly since 1997, and has a holiday home at Viscri in Transylvania.  The idea of the film is to explore why he has taken such an interest in Transylvania, and use his involvement in the region and its conservation as a peg to promote the area further. 

Subtitled ‘The story about a hidden paradise’, which goes some way to answering that question, the film will focus on the landscape which has so captivated Prince Charles.  The intention is to capture ‘the other side’ of Romania which, in the words of the Kickstarter statement is ‘peaceful’, ‘serene’ and ‘beautiful’.

Bucharest-born artist and filmmaker Nono Pirvu Lucian is behind the project and he has launched a campaign to raise £20,000 to fund it.  There are various rewards available to those who make donations.  As at this writing there are not many days left to run and it is fair to say that the total raised so far is well shy of the target.

Tied in with the film there is an associated website, which is still under construction.  It will highlight parts of Romania so far little visited by tourists, with information on suitable places to stay, in an effort to advance the sort of sustainable tourism that Prince Charles is keen to encourage.

It is a worthy project, and it would be good to see it succeed, though I’m not sure Transylvania is quite as neglected as Lucian says.  It has attracted filmmakers in the past, not least Charlie Ottley who made the Wild Carpathia series, for which he interviewed Prince Charles.  I hope the title is amended before the film is released so that it reads In the Footsteps of the Prince.

The Kickstarter page is here:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/nonopirvu/on-the-footsteps-of-the-prince-feature-documentary

The project’s website is here:

http://www.tripinro.com/

A press release is on the Digital Journal website:

http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/3820834

The Romanian Centenary Garden

A few days ago (14 June) I visited Belgrave Square in London to see the ‘Great Union Garden’ established outside the Romanian Cultural Institute (RCI), though ‘garden’ is perhaps a slight exaggeration as it is effectively a large planter located on the opposite corner to the Institute’s splendid building.  It is part of a programme put on by the Institute to commemorate the formation of a united Romania in 1918.  The square’s garden is not open to the public, but the Romanian garden lies outside the fence and is therefore accessible.

The planter has been designed roughly in the shape of Romania, ‘stylised’ in the words of the RCI (though you would need a tall ladder or a drone to get the full effect).  The space within contains flowers from all parts of Romania, laid out to mimic their distribution in the country itself.  An adjacent information panel describes the purpose of the project.

The intention is the creation of ‘a botanical metaphor’ of the various provinces that constituted Romania in 1918: Banat, Crișana, Maramureș, Transylvania, Bucovina, Moldova, Bessarabia, Dobruja, Muntenia and Oltenia.  The seeds, while being of species found in Romania, were cultivated in the UK, itself a nice metaphor for friendly relations between the two countries.

The planter is on a busy road, so it is lovely to see plants anyway, but it is a splendid way to publicise a significant date in Romania’s history.  The RCI refer to the garden as an ‘installation’ and their website indicates it will be removed this month, so anyone interested would be best advised to check before visiting it, in case it has been dismantled.

The RCI can be seen in the distance

In addition to the garden, to commemorate the centenary the RCI put on a series of events, including exhibitions, a talk, and a book launch.  The book, which was launched last month, is The Transylvania Florilegium.  Comprising two large volumes, it was inspired by Prince Charles, who thought that some plant species might be vulnerable to changing agricultural practices and suggested a visual record be made both to show the diversity of the region’s flora and to highlight the urgent need to protect the environment.

A selection of 40 of the book’s 124 paintings was put on show in the RCI along with photographs of Bucharest parks, but alas I missed the exhibition by a couple of days.  Still, I was happy to see the Great Union Garden and felt a little bit of the Romanian countryside had been successfully transferred to London’s dusty streets.

Independența României (1912)

Independența României (Independence of Romania), subtitled Războiul Româno-Ruso-Turc 1877 (The Romanian-Russo-Turkish War, 1877), is a Romanian silent film made in 1912 and directed by Aristide Demetriade (1872-1930).  The subject of the film is Romania’s 1877-8 war of independence from the Ottoman Empire.  An intertitle announces it was made with the support of the Romanian army and with members of the National Theatre in Bucharest (where Demetriade was an actor).

The film opens with peasants dancing and making merry.  But conflict is brewing between Russia and the Ottoman Empire, and the Romanian ruler, Carol I (played by Demetriade himself), summons the Council of Ministers in order to mobilise the army.  There he signs the Declaration of Independence from the Ottoman Empire.  The troops mobilise.  Back at the village an elder breaks into the dancing to read the proclamation, to general celebration by the men, but sorrow from the women.  On a personal level, the hostilities interrupt a love story and the lovers bid each other a sorrowful farewell.

A group of friends go to off to war, but one, Cobuz, falls at Calabat by stupidly sitting on top of a trench playing a pipe while his comrades dance below, making him a target for snipers.  Carol is upbeat, but the Russians get hammered by the Turks crossing the Danube.  At a Romanian camp the soldiers dance (so much dancing) and new flags are blessed.  Grand Duke Nicholas of Russia, commanding the Imperial army, sends a telegram to Carol requesting assistance to fight the Turks who are defending Plevna, and the Romanians cross the Danube on 19-20 July 1877.

The Tsar gives control of the Russian army to Carol so he can command a combined force.  After a lengthy disembarkation sequence, the allies go into battle against the Turks, who are put to flight, the Romanian cavalry wreaking havoc on the enemy.  A Turkish patrol is easily dispatched, once the riders realise they are being shot at.  Osman Pasha, wily leader of the Turks at Plevna, disposes his men, inflicting a reverse on the Romanians.  Carol gives encouragement to boost morale and his troops go on to defeat the Turks at Grivita, capturing the Turkish standard.  The Russians under General Skobeleff attack the Green Mountain.

At the Valley of Weeping the dead and dying litter the landscape until a truce allows the bodies to be buried, while Carol and Tsar Alexander II visit the wounded at a first aid station.  Here our lovers are reunited, as she is a nurse, but alas he is badly wounded.  Meanwhile at Plevna fighting continues with the Turks counter-attacking, pinning down the Russians until the Romanians intervene.  After a fierce battle the Turks capitulate.  Osman Pasha surrenders his sword to Alexander, but the Tsar returns it in honour of his gallant foe.

The Russians and Romanians are victorious, and the defeated Turks are forced to trudge under mounted escort through the snow.  Our wounded soldier and his lady love are on the side of the road returning home when a Russian column passes and the colonel shakes his hand, a token of friendship between the two countries.  A final Intertitle declares: ‘After 35 years the celebration of the independence of Romania’.  The military parade held on 10 May 1912 concludes the film.

Filmed in what was intended to be a realistic documentary style, Independenta Romaniei was propaganda promoting Romanian nationhood; the Russo-Turkish War is firmly referred to as the Romanian-Russo-Turkish War.  It is ambitious in scope for its period, and predates D W Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation, with which it bears some similarities in its epic aspirations though not in mastery of technique, by three years.  Unfortunately Demetriade was no Griffith, consistently employing a static camera with extremely long takes and pedestrian cutting between scenes that fails to generate any dynamism by their juxtaposition.

Additionally the pacing is ponderous as the director wants to make the most of his cast of hundreds, their horses and artillery pieces (if marching is involved, you can be sure that the scene will continue until every man has passed in front of the camera), but he has trouble blocking, often creating uncertainty in the viewer as to what is going on.  The cast occasionally betray their theatrical origins by overacting.

The battle scenes are amateurish to modern eyes and lack tension, failing to capture the kind of energy that Griffith was able to inject into The Birth of a Nation.  Nor does Independența României manage to integrate the national and personal in the way that the Stonemans and Camerons were used to show the effects of the American Civil War on individual families.  However, the project was hugely ambitious and Demetriade did a creditable job bringing this foundational experience of the Romanian nation to life on what was clearly a much smaller budget than Griffith had.  Whatever its flaws, Independența României was well received on its release.

The film is available on YouTube.  The original running time was about two hours but the running time of existing prints is only 82 minutes.    This version has an English translation of the intertitles:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzWhapWpm1Q

There is a Romanian-language Wikipedia page devoted to the film which is very detailed, much more so than the English-language version:

https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ro&u=https://ro.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristide_Demetriade&prev=search