In the Fog (V Tumane)

IN THE FOG (V Tumane)                   B          
Russia  Belarus  Latvia  Germany  Netherlands  (127 mi)  2012  ‘Scope  d:  Sergei Loznitsa

Official site 

Eyes and ears are poor witnesses for those men, whose souls are of barbarian nature.

—Sergei Loznitsna, film director quoting pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Heraclitus

Not sure how this film qualifies to play in the European Union Fest, as this is a decisively Russian-Belarus filmmaker, neither country members of the EU, though much of the film was shot in Latvia, the supposed country of EU origin.  Ironically the filmmaker has moved to Germany, a country with one of the best run and most efficient state-assisted cinema programs in all of Europe, allowing him to make films that would be impossible to make in Russia, also helping to produce the financing for his films.  It’s the Russians, however, that have a fondness for their own history and that of the former Soviet territories, where they never forget the terrible price paid in human lives to keep the Germans from overrunning Moscow and Stalingrad in World War II, coming within 20 miles of Moscow before the Russian lines finally held.  Over the course of the war they eventually lost anywhere from 22 to 26 million dead, 15 – 20 % of their entire population defending their nation.  Nearly every family was affected by this kind of dramatic impact, leaving behind for generations to come the terrible scars of history, where no one makes films about this era with more wretched misery than the Russians, who suffered tremendously through this unimaginable horror, perhaps best represented by The Five Best Soviet Era War Films.  Like Trial On the Road (Proverka na dorogakh) (1971), The Ascent (Voskhozhdeniye) (1976), and Come and See (Idi i smotri) (1985), all set in Belarus and all steeped in the psychological horrors of World War II when the occupying Nazi forces applied a scorched earth policy, burning Belarusian villages to the ground, slaughtering all the inhabitants, literally attempting to wipe Russians off the face of the earth, leaving whatever civilians that survived to starve or die of exposure to the cold.  Carrying the historical weight of Russian history, where more than two million were killed defending the western territory of Belarus, this is a slow moving, morally conflicted, bleak interior drama that takes place far from the front lines, where in the masterful opening shot, out of stillness heads rise out of the lower edge of a snowy forest, as we see German soldiers on horseback marching Russian prisoners into a small Belarusian village to the stare of onlookers.  After a long offscreen pronouncement, set to a slow 180 degree pan, suggesting anyone aiding or abetting those defying the prevailing German order would be shot, the order is given for the men to be publicly hanged.  

   

IN THE FOG is an existential parable much like Malick’s THE THIN RED LINE (1998), an anguished requiem for the dead where the experience of watching the film subjectively involves the viewer in a partnership with history, becoming a transforming meeting of the minds that elevates one’s understanding of events.  Told out of sequence, Loznitsa constructs a war film with no war action, a long, slow slog into the psychological descent into the madness of war, shot with cinematic depth by the same guy (Oleg Mutu) who filmed Cristian Mungiu’s Beyond the Hills (După dealuri) (2012), supposedly only 72 shots in a little over two hours, where comrades turn against comrades, suspecting there is among them a collaborator for the other side, where there is slow pacing, no musical score, and an intense, interior moral dilemma about what to do.  Its release comes at an interesting time in modern Russian history, where a film about Russian “morality” is an ironic choice during the reinstatement of the dictatorial, KGB-like police state reign of Vladimir Putin.  Perhaps not as intricately constructed as Loznitsa’s earlier brutal road movie My Joy (Schastye moe) (2010), which allowed just the briefest sliver of light, in both mood is paramount to character, told in long takes with near documentary precision through mostly empty, snowy landscapes, an existential journey following two or three characters as they make their way behind enemy lines through the natural protection of the dense forests.  The story concerns Sushenya (Vladimir Svirski), whose story remains a shrouded mystery lost in the fog, revealed only near the end in flashback for the audience’s benefit, where no one in the film ever hears it.  This is the kind of history, personal, family, and national, that gets lost during wartime.  Based on a novel by Belarusian writer Vasily Bykov, Sushenya is a local railroad worker for nearly thirty years, ordered by his boss to continue working for the Germans or he’d be killed, so what real choice does he have?  

Sushenya could just as easily be anybody, as all fell victim to circumstances beyond their control, and he is sympathetically portrayed throughout as he makes his way through a hellish landscape that continually leaves him no choice.  Accused of being a German collaborator, two Soviet partisans arrive out of the forest to execute him, one a lifelong friend who takes no pleasure in his duty.  Instead it’s his friend that is shot and severely wounded in an unexpected ambush, where Sushenya is forced to carry him on his back in an absurdist Sisyphus reference as they attempt to make their way to safety.  Despite their partisan loyalties, each man is viewed traveling this isolated journey alone, as that is how they will be judged by history, expressed through extended minimalist sequences of long shots trekking through the wintry forest where man is nearly inconsequential, a mere solitary speck, engulfed in the immense natural landscape and of time immemorial.  Sushenya is continually judged by others, Nazi’s and partisans, even his own family, where during wartime, a full accounting of the truth never comes out until the distance of time passes and people can objectively investigate facts, circumstances and allegations.  But during the imposition of unspeakable violence and the blurry events of war, everything comes down to immediate perceptions, where Sushenya can’t believe why his wife or his lifelong friends would choose to believe the German accounts rather than his own, doubting his pleas of innocence, somehow forgetting everything that they ever knew about him because of an accusation from Nazi criminals and cutthroat murderers.  All that he knows about humanity quickly spins on its ear, where everything that matters is suddenly gone forever, leaving him in a state of abject misery and horror.  This kind of nightmarish journey takes us to the other side of darkness where the end of the world is near, very similar to the coming apocalypse expressed in Béla Tarr’s last film The Turin Horse (2011).  While Tarr visually expresses the external reality, Loznitsa explores the last gasp, the internalized personal anguish of all light going out of the world, and, if not for Loznitsa and this film, all would be forgotten.

Beyond the Hills (După dealuri)

BEYOND THE HILLS (După dealuri)             B                     

Romania  France  Belgium  (150 mi)  2012  ‘Scope  d:  Cristian Mungiu

Mungiu has written and/or adapted a story inspired by the non-fiction novels of contemporary Romanian author Tatiana Niculescu Bran, a former senior editor of the Bucharest branch of the BBC News division, supposedly basing this story on real events, where there was also a 2007 stage version.  Despite its length, much of the film’s story remains shrouded under an ambiguous cloud of uncertainty, where little backstory is provided and the true nature of the two protagonist’s (both non-professionals) relationship is never revealed other than they both spent their childhood in a state orphanage, most likely subjected to systematic abuse.  When they left the orphanage, they apparently took different turns, where Voichita (Cosmina Stratan) has been fully accepted into a remote convent in rural Romania, which by embracing God seems to have given her a purpose in life, where a rhythm of life is established by observing a myriad of duties performed by each of the nuns in a collective spirit of worship and devotion.  Her friend Alina (Cristina Flutur) has other ideas, as she’s visiting Voichita with hopes of rekindling a former love affair where they could run off together.  Voichita is fully committed to God, however, but embraces Alina in her heart, as outside of Alina’s mentally challenged brother, the two of them have no living family, so they remain closely attached to each another.  It’s clear from the outset Alina has no interest in God or the monastery, but just wants her lover, while Voichita covers up her friend’s real intent and instead offers pleas to the Mother Superior and Orthodox Priest to have mercy on her as she has noplace else to go, proposing the idea that embracing God may offer what she needs, as it has for everyone else, which buys them some time together. 

Alina, however, has a mean-tempered and violent streak, apparently exacerbated after being urged to offer a full confession, where the audience never learns the depth of inner torment she was forced to release, but her violent behavior afterwards offers a hint as to its toxic nature, as she starts cussing out and attacking some of the nuns, where they literally tie her in restraints to keep her from hurting anyone before taking her to the hospital where she is medicated.  Likely because there’s no monetary incentive, the hospital provides only the basic level of care, where much of this feels like The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005), as the hospital doesn’t wish to run further tests, even though there are signs she may suffer from schizophrenia, so they simply avoid responsibility by passing her back to the monastery, suggesting rest is what she needs.  This plays into the stereotypical view that monasteries are all about quiet prayer and reflection, but due to the rugged location of this particular religious community, much of their time is spent doing hard work outdoors.  Initially Alina is calm as she’s been prescribed medications, where she is compliant, and due to the urging of Voichita, makes feeble attempts to embrace God, but the obsession with sin, combined with the fact she likely stopped taking her medication, seems to drive her over the edge, where her instability is affecting the overall harmony of the community, so the Priest sends her back to her last foster family, but they’ve already replaced her with somebody else and literally have no room.  With their return once again, the Priest is running out of options. 

What’s immediately apparent to anyone in the audience is that Alina does not belong in a monastery, but Voichita’s continual pleas to the authorities suggest otherwise, where she’s literally cramming God down this girl’s throat because she knows no other option.  This narrow view of religion seems to be the focus of the film—that people don’t really pray for others as they mostly pray for themselves, using religion for whatever selfish reasons they can imagine.  The Priest is no more interested in helping Alina than the hospital, as both just wish to be rid of her, but instead of doing the charitable thing, which would be reaching out into the nearby community that they service and finding her a family or another church where she could stay temporarily, but instead both institutions exist in an island unto themselves, separate and apart from the real world.  Voichita is not the most educated and her attempts to help end up doing more harm than good, but her motives are well-meaning—she simply doesn’t know any better. The film goes off the rails, somewhat, when the church's narrow views prevail, protecting their own interests, literally existing in their own mythology, completely abandoning common sense or a connection to modernity, becoming a backwater religion retreating to the 5th century by resurrecting ancient religious rituals, desperately performing an exorcism to drive the evil spirits out of Alina, whose only real sin appears to be continually questioning the legitimacy of God on earth, as in her life God’s mercy has been all but absent.  Shot in ‘Scope by Oleg Mutu, the winterized countryside becomes a fully realized, silent character in the film, as it provides much of the film’s compositional texture, where the visualized naturalism is starkly bleak, without a hint of music, as people wear winter jackets to sleep in, and every breath has an icy chill.  But the film fails to generate the same impact as 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days (4 luni, 3 saptamâni... (2007), as the people onscreen are less compelling and not as disturbingly intense, veering into a state of melodramatic hysteria late in the film that just feels overly contrived and all too predictable.  

The Death of Mr. Lazarescu

director Cristi Puiu








THE DEATH OF MR. LAZARESCU     B+               

Romania  (153 mi)  2005  d:  Cristi Puiu      

Shot with such laser-like realism, many viewers may think this is a searing documentary about the abysmally corrupt Romanian State authorities, as seen through what resembles an antiquated, Kafkaesque health care system.  Sitting through this film is like putting in an extra shift at work, as it amazingly resembles the ordinary rhythms and pace of being at work.  Viewers should be receiving time and a half compensation, as we’re subjected to the mediocrity and prejudices and everyday mistreatment from several hospital staffs, resulting in a scathing and uncompromising look at class inequity, as the treatment of Mr. Lazarescu would be completely different if he was from another economic scale, or if he was somebody.  It recalls the legendary death of blues great Bessie Smith, written about in Downbeat magazine by white record producer John Hammond after she was injured in an auto accident, where she was allegedly refused treatment at three different white hospitals before finally succumbing at a black hospital.  This rumor lasted for decades, and was even re-mythologized in Edward Albee’s 1959 play The Death of Bessie Smith.  As it turns out, despite Mr. Hammond’s refusal to recant his story, there is no truth to this total fabrication.  Yet even if untrue, this mythical tale exposes a truth about Southern racism.  LAZARESCU, accordingly, stands as a mythical tale of societal indifference.    

LAZARESCU, though seemingly real, is a complete fabrication, shot by Oleg Mutu, scripted by the director and co-writer Razvan Radulescu, using professional actors to recreate two and a half hours of ultra realism to scathingly expose multiple truths about social injustice that could be anywhere around the world, telling the story of a man who survived the American WWII bombing campaign over Romania in 1944, which is his last coherent memory, his last moment of dignity before he loses consciousness from a series of fatal medical ailments, including a swollen liver which is placing dangerous blood pressure against his brain.  The film shows how random the quality of medical care can be, where the standard seems to be pawning off patients as someone else’s responsibility, as poor Mr. Lazarescu is driven from hospital to hospital, each distinctly unwilling to deal with him as a patient needing medical care, instead they start creating myths or rumors deconstructing who he is.  He’s a drunk, an alcoholic, he smells, he pees on himself, he’s been drinking so he’s getting what he deserves, does he have any family, is he anybody, is he alone, we can’t help him, why not try someplace else? 

The same series of 3-minute emergency room tests are performed at each different hospital, and the entire process stops dead in its tracks, turning from chaos to a hushed quiet as the doctors are looked upon as holy shamans, demanding absolute obedience as if sent from on high, to perform this exact same standard medical procedure, yet somehow, in each hospital except the last, the medical teams are not up to helping this hopelessly ill man.  They view him as an irritating interruption of their routines.  Even when they eventually perform brain and liver scans, it takes a series of bribes and personal favors, even sexual flattery, to finally get him the tests he needs.  The last hospital, however, doesn’t mess around.  They simply perform professionally according to the need, but by that time, the patient is near death.  He isn’t answering any questions, he isn’t making a fuss, he is completely docile and helpless, as patients are so much easier to render assistance to when they can’t utter a word.  Earlier in the night, he was something of a chatterbox, confusing friend and foe alike, which as it turned out, only prolonged his humiliating ordeal.  Initially, this was expected to be the first of a six part series, but that ambitious project never materialized.  The Romanian writer/director, who’s afraid of flying, opted not to show up for the Chicago Film Festival, but his film took home the Silver Hugo 2nd prize.

4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days (4 luni, 3 saptamâni si 2 zile)

4 MONTHS, 3 WEEKS AND 2 DAYS          A                    

Romania  (113 mi)  2007  ‘Scope  d:  Cristian Mungiu

A reflection of life in Romania under the Ceauşescu era, set in 1987, this is the story of a young girl’s attempts to obtain a cheap abortion on the black market, where every aspect of society is layered in corruption and lies, revealing a society where truth has little value, where learning to operate through the lies is like making your way through a minefield, where some lucky ones may get through, but only by accident.  Meanwhile, many people’s lives are routinely trampled over by the societal indifference to other people’s problems.  While it has a similar scenario as The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005), both films shot by Oleg Mutu using a fluid in-your-face, hand-held camera, intensely following the lives of a few people over the course of a few hours, this actually has a greater dramatic impact and could easily be called one day in the life of a decent person in an indecent society.  Many who watch this film will wonder what all the fuss is about, why it was awarded the Palme D’Or at Cannes as the Festival winner this year, believing it is a “good” but not a great film, as it can be pretty slow going for awhile, actually plodding along at times, where the final effect accumulates much of its power through misdirection, by “not” being what we expect.  The girl who gets pregnant, Găbiţa (Laura Vasiliu) and her college dorm roommate Otilia (Anamaria Marinca), are two fairly ordinary girls who go about their business thinking this day is like any other day.  Only through the accumulation of detail, and one brilliant performance from the best friend do we come to appreciate just how many different levels this film is operating on, not the least of which is the abortion itself, which is captured in its entirety, seen as a despicable act that becomes a catalyst of something that takes on a life of its own in this film. 

Few will be impressed by the drab, bleached out colors, or by the use of ‘Scope, which wasn’t used to any particular effect except perhaps in a dinner sequence, squeezing many people all into one shot, where we could follow several people’s gestures and body language all at the same time, actually becoming one of the turning points of the film, but other than that, the garbage and litter that seemed etched into every street scene was simply expanded to more of it.  Most of the film takes place inside cramped rooms, occasionally opening to the world outside, but only briefly.  What is actually probed is not any external condition that a camera could beautify or dramatize, but the internalized feelings of one remarkable character, allowing the camera to linger and gaze, giving the audience the full impact of the moment, which happens repeatedly throughout the film.  Oftentimes the other character isn’t even seen at all, only heard, but there are some extraordinary conversations in this film, all written by the director.  Two in particular that stand out are what follows the hushed silence moments right after the abortionist exits and also the previously mentioned dinner sequence which was simply a phenomenal scene, perfectly balancing both the interior and exterior worlds, rivaling some of Hou Hsiao-hsien’s signature shots in several of his films, where the opening of Flowers of Shanghai (Hai shang hua) (1998) comes to mind.  Without using a musical soundtrack, but presented through a grim, realist style, this may take us back to Kieslowski’s gritty, down to earth world of moral anxiety, where individual choices were forced up against the wall of authoritarian inflexibility, where all choices were impossible.  

This is one of the first Eastern European films to challenge the entrenched patriarchal hierarchy.  In the film, the remedy for a specifically female problem (abortion) doesn't exist outside the black market, only harsh punishments and consequences, where there are no such consequences designed for the male who contributed to the pregnancy.  But this only opens up the view of inequity in the film, which becomes less about the woman who has the abortion and more about the singular developing psychological outrage of her friend, who is blindsided by the blasé attitude of indifference from her girlfriend, who learns to cringe at the crudeness of the thoughts coming out of her own boyfriend and his family, intelligent yet ordinary people who have been conditioned to accept the prevailing order.  This film has a throbbing sense of dramatic urgency, where abortion is seen as not only emblematic of an entire ineffectual system where individualized needs are viewed as outlawed, subject to serious criminal penalties, where women are forced to expose and humiliate themselves to underhanded black market profiteers, but it becomes a full-fledged feminist treatise on the gulf that separates the sexes, dramatically revealing in excruciatingly real terms just how systematically entrenched in backwards thinking men (and many women) remain, still blindly incapable and perhaps unwilling to understand their own culpability in creating and maintaining insufferable conditions for humans to endure, where suppressing the rights of others is typically a product of historically ingrained masculine ideology.