Portretul luptatorului la tinerete

As a romanian,i feel sad for my grand and grand grand-parents for what they experienced in that period of time,communism didin t made people bright quite contrary.

a testimony. this is its basic trait. an impressive proof about the force of history. a film about sacrifice for values. the theme is the most important challenge for director. because it is large and profound and subtle. because , except Memorialul durerii, does not exist a precedent to show the fight, the ideals and the sacrifice of few people, who, in the name of an ideal, fight against Comunist regime. but, ignoring the expectations, errors and good intentions, the film has a noble virtue - to be the first step to discover the truths of recent past. a form of exorcism. to remember, to show, to demonstrate, to maintain the image of a model alive. this is its basic purpose. and the motif to see it.

Tragic fight of few partisans against new order of state wich brought communism in an agrarian, a peasants country and lasted for 50 years in wich the nation s identity is altered. few fought and almost all died for that. let us not forget.

more than a film, it is a testimony. cruel, fresh, profound. a kind a documentary. instrument to stop forgiveness. so, the opinion must be more subtle. because the desire of director is obvious - build a chronicle of Romanian resistance against Communism. the story of Ioan Gavrilă - Ogoraru and his group. and the work was impressive, behind ordinary errors of this ambitious step, behind the Manichean parts, behind the passion who makes things only skin of shadows. it is a courageous project. sad, harsh, honest, far from pink surrogates. it is drawing of truth, sufferance and sacrifice. its seed - Memorialul durerii. its heart - the conscience of past as modeling of present. a gray movie. mixture of fear, ideal, mud and strong values. a lesson - film. about the root of a society. and a vision about fight against pure evil.

Indeed, first of all, I consider that this movie should be seen by as many Romanian citizens as possible (at least this is my wish and the main purpose of this review) but I think that any foreigner can also enjoy its beauty.

Why all the Romanian citizens should see this movie? A part of the answer to this question results directly from reading the synopsis. Still, I will add a few words. I consider that the story showed in this movie is among the few historical facts which could help us (Romanian citizens – mainly the young generation) not to be so ashamed of our people's cowardice shown during the communist period, until the '89 Revolution.

This is the story of a few courageous (if not insanely courageous) young men fighting the Monster, or just in fact opposing the Monster (until the presumed arrival of the Americans). They fight also their fear of death, strangely enough by trying to concentrate on another fear - more important – that of being condemned by their sons of cowardice.

The other part of the answer is the same as for the question "Why should any other foreigner see this movie?" and I will try to present the other qualities of the movie, beside the story.

I liked a lot the script because there are a lot of smart lines. I liked especially the sequences that show in parallel: 1) the speeches of the police (securitate) with the all the necessary instructions in order to catch the enemy and 2) the scenes with the interrogations and torturing taking place in reality – not quite following the soft indications given from above … . The alternation of these two "worlds" is made brilliantly and is more effective then any documentary movie with a 3 hours speech on the inhumanity of the communist regime.

I was deeply moved by two scenes which showed the love of a mother and the love for a friend. I don't remember such similar powerful scenes in any other movie. Of course, I might be subjective in my preference, but I am sure they will move you too.

I liked the way the director chose to shoot the group scenes with the young heroes. In some of them nothing happens indeed (as action) but they show so much and make us understand them better and even entering (if we choose) the atmosphere. You can feel the high grass touching you also, the cold raindrops dripping on your skin as well…

I liked the alternation of the colored scenes with the (more rare) black and white scenes. The scenes in black and white are shown blurry and I found them very appropriate for the story and they added a lot of beauty to the movie. Beside these sequences in black and white, there are a lot of very beautiful images (the landscapes in Fagaras' mountains; the portraits of our heroes and of the other characters in different situations, using different lights and shadows …).

Why not a 10 then? Only a nine … Mainly, because the actor playing the main character is not succeeding to convince us that he feels, he understands the profound and beautiful lines … But, as he speaks pretty rare this doesn't affect the movie that much.

It's already too long this review … but I hope that at least it will serve its' purpose.