Filantropica

In Romania they call it the 'transition' period. Whoever invented this term meant to describe the period between Communist Romania and a normal society, a period where people can recover dignity, learn speaking the truth and trust their human fellows. The issue is that in Romania, as in all other former Communist countries this period was marked by a great amount of dis-illusions, by many broken dreams and destinies as the recovery proved not to be easy neither on the economic not on human plans. The place of human relations was taken by tricks and robbery, the emptiness of the Communist slogans was replaced by the emptiness of the commercial TV, surviving as a human being is tough.

'Filantropica' presents a point of view which may be unknown or hard to catch for many non-Romanian viewers. The Romanian literature and theater has a great satiric tradition, and the founder of absurd comedy theater Eugene Ionesco was of Romanian origin. This is where the villain characters in 'Filantropica' like the one of the master combinator played by Gheorghe DInica come from, although the figure of the little professor of literature dreaming to overcome his miserable condition (through money? through love?) played by Mircea Diaconu is as universal as a Benigni or Woody Allen would have created it.

Some comments consider 'Filantropica' as the best film of the Romanian cinema. I believe that this is an exaggeration, there are certain flaws especially the extended and un-justified use of off-screen voice in the first part of the movie. 'Moartea Domnului Lazarescu' of Cristi Puiu, another movie inspired by the reality of the same period is a better film, with somehow a more optimistic message. Yet this is an important film about this complex period in the history of Romania.

This is amazing. A true masterpiece. It is definetely the best romanian movie ever made. A great comedy about richness, poorness, love. Very well written, some scenes will make you laugh with tears, great one liners. And also what can i say about the director, Nae Caranfil? Perfect. It sometimes reminds me of Guy Ritchie. All in all, an amazing movie. If you have the chance to see it, all over the world, do it, it's awesome.

Are you laughing or are you crying? I dunno and this realistic view on today's life in some east European country (Romania) makes you aware that the power is in hands of those who are related to the mob. "Filantropica" tells the story of an ordinary man, a schoolteacher who writes some books in his free time (without success). He earns enough to keep himself alive but from the moment he wants something out of line (sympathy for a gorgeous looking girl) he has just one route : following the route of crime. "Filantropica" shows perfect how the mob is involved in everything, from televisionshows till the beggar on the street and it might be a very hard movie, it's a brilliant masterpiece of today's society. Absolute must!

I am used to Romanian movies being dark, verbally violent, poorly acted, poorly directed, wanting to shock, yet saying nothing. Most of them are like that, but not this one. This was actually a dark comedy with almost no violence. The threads of the story do end in despair, but not in tragedy, giving the viewer that "jigsaw puzzle completed" feeling.

The acting of the main characters was superb, even the extras did their job well; the script contains a too complex and interesting story to be told here, all I can say is that it's a great tale; the music gives a Romanian feel to the movie and nicely selected for this particular idea; the directing has to be good, since almost none of the actors slipped, none of the scenes made me say "Cut" :) and the movie carried me from the first scene to the last with no discrepancies.

This movie may have turned my pessimistic view of Romanian film-making around, along with "Asfalt Tango", which is a movie of the same caliber and quality (with the same great main actor ) and I am looking forward to good, watchable movies like these two, with great and original stories.

I had the exquisite privilege to see the film's premiere and since then I've been to see it five more times. It is the best Romanian film ever made. From the script writing (plot) to acting, costumes, camera movements, editing, everything has so high a quality it acquires international value. The disadvantage of it being so Romanian may diminish a lot of its humor for foreign viewers, but there is something universal about humor that makes the bittersweet truth reach the humanity of each member of the audience rather than their nationality. It is a sour sweet satire of the contemporary Romanian society and underworld of which fiction one begins to doubt as credits start rolling.

This is for those who don't know how the director looks like: Nae Caranfil has a cameo as a Karaoke singer. Does the foreign audience applaud when there is a good scene or when the director appears in a cameo, like they did here?

What else? The Romanian film critics had designated "Filantropica" as representative for our country in Best Foreign Picture pre-nominations for the Academy Awards. Unfortunately, they didn't know much about publicity and didn't even come up with all the necessary data for the sites & all, but this does not diminish the film's value and the excuse may be that the event was a first time ever.