I went to see this movie in 1982, in an empty movie theater in Bucharest. There were maybe 10 people in the audience. The movie is probably impossible to find now, and the humor may be dated - but at the time it seems like the best comedy ever made. I literally laughed for an hour and a half and I wasn't smoking anything. The separation scene, when the two protagonists divide their meager belongings ( "a penguin", "that's mine") still cracks me up when I remember it. Directed by Iosif Demian (Nunta de Piatra) it is mainly dialog driven, with Dorel Visan in his greatest comic performance.
This is the failed love story between a farming cooperative president (CAP) and his agricultural engineer. Their marriage breaks up soon after the wedding, and they are trying to put their life together. The life in a Romanian village during Communist years is presented in all is misery and pretense, but with a light and tender loving humor. It was at the time an under-appreciated piece of propaganda subversion, made more subtle and effective by the director attempt to pretend that it is not.
