Sieranevada

With a delay of three years I managed to see Cristi Puiu's 'Sieranevada', a film that I had read and heard much about. Three years are certainly not enough for a 'historical' perspective but they are enough to better place the film in the context of what happened in the Romanian cinema before and after it and to understand the rather heated disputes it has created among critics and viewers. The film is indeed complex but also complicated, interesting but also long, providing many reasons to like it but also a few that can leave viewers from different categories of audience confused or dissatisfied.

The opening scene looks like a quote from the other new wave, the French one. A camera set up at a fixed point shoots for a few minutes a Bucharest intersection, with the chaos, agglomeration and noise that we know. The characters of the film, which we do not distinguish, are still silhouettes among the many that make up this hubbub. We'll follow two of them in a car that drives them for several minutes to the apartment where most of the action of the film is taking place. There they join the family reunited for the commemoration meal (following a regional traditional custom!) of the head of the family, who had died 40 days ago. For two hours, almost in real time, we will witness the ceremony, discussions, conflicts of a family large enough to include some of the characters known to those living in Romania today - the physician who abandoned his job for a more profitable trade , a young supporter of conspiracy theories, the older generation of those economically affected by the transition who try to adapt with little success to the new realities, a nostalgic for the communist regime, the young woman with dubious connections and habits including suspected drug use, the priest who is late due to a busy schedule because the religious business is going full on, couples in crisis or marriages already broken up. A beautifully constructed mosaic, a diverse and tormented world. And yet, they will also meet at future occasions or holidays, because family and friendship ties, together with adherence to a religious tradition that is not forgotten or abandoned, are the only links that somehow hold together the Romanian social fabric. These and maybe also the humor.

It is worth watching how Cristi Puiu and his cinematographer Barbu Balasoiu work with the camera. Sometimes the frame is fixed, most often mobile, it follows the point of view of one character or another, giving the feeling of a claustrophobic maze in the 3 or 4 room apartment where the action takes place. It is a sensation programmatically induced to the spectators, when we are outside the apartment we are dealing with the same chaos, with the same maze of human relations in crisis, only that the spaces are more open, but the atmosphere is frozen. The semi-darkness predominates and makes the film not easy to watch, also the sound capture is not optimal, but I think that the reason does not lie in technical issues but in the decisions of the director. Acting is superb, mentioning any name will do an injustice to all the other. The film captivated me and I did not feel or resempt the length at any time. But I can understand those who did not like the duration, or had difficulties in tracking the image or voices, because Cristi Puiu did not aim the aesthetics but wanted to convey ideas and sensations. Foreign viewers will have difficulties understanding many nuances, and those in Romania who are tired or exasperated by the mirrors that some of the contemporary directors put in front of them also have reasons to be upset. As much as I liked the movie, I believe that the minimalist formula has exhausted its resources and has certainly lost the elements of surprise and novelty. That's why I'm not surprised that the movie was ignored in the Cannes palmares. In 2005, Cristi Puiu made one of the first remarkable films of the new wave of Romanian cinema - 'The Death of Mr. Lazarescu'. 'Sieranevada' made in 2016 may be one of the last outstanding films of this wave.

Family drama has never portrayed this good. You are invited into this family's house during the aftermath of a funeral in the wintertime. It gets very intense.

This is definitely a carefully crafted movie by a gifted director.

The result is disappointing though: way too long.

I enjoyed the fact that it captures real conflicts and emotions.

Could have done that in half the time though.

Good film for movies snobs.

I don't know why but I found this movie really good. It resembled to the the high school book I had to read in my time, Enigma Otiliei or like Morometii book & screen play. Like all Romanian movies, it has that drama-parody of being a post-communist member; like all the good post-revolution movies. This movie is from the same category. But! And there's a huge "But". This movie has a really tangled and well-structured story line. The characters are really complex. I loved the "detailed" small-talks that took place alongside the main story. Also, like many Romanian families, you have that huge abundance of relatives that you have to deal with. You have that "It's family!" saying that your mother told you every time you couldn't stand your cousin when you were little. Also, all the actors seem to play their parts really well. I've seen almost all the good Romanian movies and I can say that these are some hardcore actors. They fit so well with their characters and their performance is almost perfect. Yes, it has the downsides that all Romanian movies have: the static scenes and the bad sound quality. You have to have subtitle otherwise, most of the time, if you are Romanian, you won't understand a word. All of this being said, enjoy! It's just a pure South-Eastern Week-end story event!

I love this movie completely! I went to see it in a Friday evening, 9 PM, but it won my full attention from the first line! I have enjoyed every single second of its 3 hours although I was tired and it changed my spirit, made me laugh, made me think, made me happy. It is a movie created from our very essence as a nation, from our each and every archetype, from our collective or individual beliefs, but with a director touch of genius that makes the movie to be an incredible story and an amazing movie experience. It is, for sure a state of mind movie, but, at the same time, I believe it's one movie that builds its own state into your mind. The thing I loved the most about the movie is the dynamics of the characters, each being its own archetype and what happens between them is completely delusional (in its best sense). The choice of the actors - truly inspired, every one fits its character best and it feels like you are really in that apartment with them as the synergy created is so well built. Highly recommend it! Congrats to our talented directors, for such an incredible year for the Romanian movie scene!