The five best films from the Tran­sil­va­nia Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val 2016

To dis­cov­er an inter­na­tion­al film fes­ti­val that feels more like a pas­sion project than an indus­try-ori­ent­ed event is a rar­i­ty. Now in its 15^th year, the 2016 Tran­sil­va­nia Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val felt like just that; offer­ing up an eclec­tic, care­ful­ly curat­ed pro­gramme. Set in Transylvania’s his­toric cap­i­tal, Cluj-Napoca, the screen­ings spanned numer­ous venues, most of which are nes­tled among the Goth­ic church­es and mod­ern apart­ment blocks, across the city.

Com­ing to terms with the past is a promi­nent recur­ring theme in con­tem­po­rary Roman­ian cin­e­ma, with recent films such as Cris­t­ian Mungiu’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and Radu Muntean’s The Paper Will be Blue reflect­ing the trau­ma of Nico­lae Ceaușescu’s Com­mu­nist régime. Mem­o­ry of life between 1965 – 1989 con­tin­ues to inform the cur­rent gen­er­a­tion of Roman­ian film­mak­ers, some of whom pre­sent­ed new films in the Roman­ian Days side­bar. The grow­ing inter­na­tion­al suc­cess of direc­tors such as Cristi Puiu, Radu Jude and Cor­neliu Porum­boiu, means the fes­ti­val is now seen as a sol­id launch­ing pad for new Roman­ian cin­e­ma. Here are five films to look out from this year’s programme.

Gabriel Achim’s The Last Day, a dark com­e­dy about faith, fideli­ty and for­give­ness, stood out among a strong selec­tion of Roman­ian films. A road-movie about dilem­mas of the soul, the film charts the jour­ney under­tak­en by four men accom­pa­ny­ing their friend to a near­by monastery to start a new life as a monk. The­ol­o­gy and phi­los­o­phy are dis­cussed with light­heart­ed aban­don en route, with the con­ver­sa­tion grow­ing more intense as the men make their way back home. The final half-hour sees the joc­u­lar humour take a turn for the worst dur­ing a vod­ka infused break­fast of bar­be­cued meats and drunk­en boast­ing that teas­es out the film’s big reveal. A com­mand­ing and intel­lec­tu­al­ly grat­i­fy­ing work from a direc­tor worth keep­ing an eye on.

Before the screen­ing of Bog­dan Mirică’s Dogs, the audi­ence were treat­ed to a sur­prise screen­ing of Why Me? a short film by Dan Chisu about a group of young Roman­ian direc­tors frus­trat­ed by how their films are con­stant­ly over­looked by pre­mière league fes­ti­vals like Cannes and Berlin in favour of their bet­ter-known com­pa­tri­ots. It was a ral­ly­ing call for a dif­fer­ent kind of Roman­ian cin­e­ma, a call Mir­ică appar­ent­ly chose to accept. His film’s pre­mière at Cannes this year divid­ed critics.

Although the film was praised for its tech­ni­cal accom­plish­ments, many found it too deriv­a­tive and indebt­ed to pop­u­lar Amer­i­can cin­e­ma. It would be a shame if their dis­ap­point­ment was a direct result of the film’s refusal to adhere to the social-real­ist aes­thet­ic that has become syn­ony­mous with the Roman­ian New Wave, as Mir­ică has pub­licly stat­ed that Dogs is an inten­tion­al attempt to carve out a place in the main­stream, albeit while main­tain­ing a dis­tinct­ly Roman­ian flavour. His approach clear­ly res­onat­ed with the TIFF jury, who award­ed film the Tran­sil­va­nia Trophy.

A young Roman­ian house­keep­er signs up for more than she bar­gained for in this goth­ic hor­ror by Iran­ian-born, Den­mark-based direc­tor Ali Abbasi. Cos­mi­na Stratan, best known for her prize win­ning per­for­mance in Cris­t­ian Mungiu’s Beyond the Hills, plays Ele­na, a for­mer accoun­tant from Bucharest who moves to Den­mark to work as a maid so she can save enough mon­ey to buy an apart­ment for her fam­i­ly. An exam­ple of what hap­pens when the priv­i­leged are forced to encounter the real­i­ties of the poor, Elena’s employ­ers are a wealthy cou­ple liv­ing a self-reliant lifestyle in a cot­tage set deep with­in the Dan­ish coun­try­side, far removed from all of life’s mod­ern amenities.

It’s a set­ting that harks back to the gold­en age of hor­ror, before advance­ments in tech­nol­o­gy increased the implau­si­bil­i­ty fac­tor. One day they ask her if she’ll act as a sur­ro­gate so they can have a child. After some con­sid­er­a­tion she agrees, see­ing it as a quick way to raise the funds she need. The preg­nan­cy goes well at first, until Elena’s body starts to reject the fetus. Preg­nant with malig­nan­cy and Goth­ic dread, Shel­ley uses the bio­log­i­cal occu­pan­cy of child bear­ing to con­struct a deeply unset­tling tale about the wider-reach­ing effects of eco­nom­ic migration.

Pol­ish direc­tor Tomasz Wasilews­ki returned to the fes­ti­val as a mem­ber of the Jury. He was last in Cluj in 2013 when his sec­ond fea­ture, Float­ing Sky­scrap­ers, won the best direc­tor prize. This year he brought along Unit­ed States of Love, a for­mi­da­ble study of four women’s search for ful­fil­ment in post-com­mu­nist Poland.

Lensed by Mol­da­vian cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er Oleg Mutu, best known for his work on The Death of Mr Lazares­cu and 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, this was eas­i­ly the most visu­al­ly strik­ing and for­mal­ly auda­cious films to screen at this year’s fes­ti­val. Mutu’s exquis­ite palette of washed-out greys and blues is beau­ti­ful­ly attuned to the inte­ri­or chaos con­sum­ing his char­ac­ters. By posi­tion­ing female iso­la­tion with­in the social con­text of a nation expe­ri­enc­ing a new­found sense of free­dom this ago­nis­ing tale of polit­i­cal and psy­cho­log­i­cal trans­for­ma­tion blos­soms into a more uni­ver­sal alle­go­ry of repressed female desire.

The rau­cous applause that greet­ed Cristi Puiu as he took the stage to intro­duce his lat­est film is tes­ti­mo­ny to how impor­tant a role he has played in Roman­ian cin­e­ma. Sier­aneva­da is a cramped fam­i­ly dra­ma where the past and present col­lide and the absur­di­ties of dai­ly life are laid bare. Almost three hours are spent in the poky Bucharest flat of Nasu Mir­i­ca (Dana Dog­a­ru) as her fam­i­ly bick­er about the past, and share old sto­ries dur­ing a memo­r­i­al ser­vice for her late hus­band Emil.

Puiu sets his cam­era up in the cor­ner of the cor­ri­dor, pressed against the wall as if it were Emil’s spir­it observ­ing each guest as they come and go, bar­ing wit­ness to the bub­bling ani­mos­i­ty and mul­ti­ple lay­ers of con­flict that ensue. Sier­aneva­da is pri­mar­i­ly con­cerned with the past and how it con­tin­ues to haunt the nation, it’s a ghost sto­ry, albeit one with­out any sem­blance of hor­ror. It’s also a com­e­dy with­out any jokes; with the script’s pitch-black humour evolv­ing nat­u­ral­ly as we grad­u­al­ly get acquaint­ed with each fam­i­ly mem­ber. This nuanced por­trait of Romania’s mid­dle class is a touch­ing and often hilar­i­ous inquiry into com­mu­ni­ca­tion, famil­ial rela­tions and how we inter­pret memory.