Utopia Impusa

The documentary film 'Utopia impusa' ('The Imposed Utopia') was made in 2009. That was the year of the 20th anniversary of the fall of the communist regime in Romania, and screenwriter Lucian Dan Teodorovici and director Marius Barna felt the need to tell the younger generations, or to remind the older ones with shorter memory, what communism meant in Romania. It's been 10 years since then. Romania celebrates in 2019 the 30th anniversary. The young generation which is today at the age of full creativity and working power knows communism only from the history books and from the stories told by their parents. Outside the borders of Romania the little that was known about the strange repressive national-communist regime which had made of Romania one of the saddest countries in Europe is long forgotten. Movies like 'Utopia impusa' are necessary as informative material for those who do not know, as a source of reflection for those who remember and try to understand and as an argument for debate against negationists and the strange category of nostalgics (out of ignorance? out of interest? ) for one of the darkest periods in the history of Romania.

The format of the film is neither the most original nor the most attractive. Seven topics are addressed regarding the mechanisms of oppression and manipulation used by the communist regime - from the necktie of the pioneers, a symbol of indoctrination from the earliest ages, passing through the mechanism of terror established by the secret police and the psychological profiles of its agents at different periods, and up to endless and humiliating lines for commodities, for anything in fact, or to the interference in the intimate lives of couples, and especially women, by criminalizing abortions. No new documents are brought, no unexpected revelations are made, instead the memories and comments of those who lived the time are used. The selection of storytellers seemed good to me, although some of them, in particular the main presenter, Mircea Diaconu, continued on towards disputable political careers. For those who lived the communist period, the film brings nothing new, while for the younger generations the stories can sound like a collection of absurd stories, descended from the worlds of Kafka and Orwell. And yet, that was the incredible past.

At some point in the future somebody will probably write a history of how the communist period is described in Romanian movies - the artistic or fictional ones, and the documentary ones. 'Utopia impusa' will occupy a honorable place. I am convinced that if it had been made today, the film would have looked different. For the Romanian viewers, I felt that the main missing element is the connection with the present. Communism is not a chapter of history that was closed forever in December 1989. It left deep sequels in the national psychology and in the state institutions. The consequences continue not only for those who have lived and cannot forget that period, but also for those who have not lived and suffer the effects of its dark heritage. From this point of view, films like 'Utopia impusa' are part of a process of self-knowledge.

This documentary might have been better if they have only chosen a better cast. The team choose a local star cast. There are a few exceptions. But the stars are there to lie, to make their best of showing a distance from the system.

It is also ironic to have the some talk about communist symbolism with disdain as some have happily moved to the same kind of ritual and symbols by joining the orthodox church. Maybe that move is a lie too, a way to distance themselves from the recent past with which have made a lot of compromise.

Yes, life was bad. It was about indoctrination. But this film follows unreliable witnesses making the whole enterprise unreliable.

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