Peu m'importe si l'histoire nous considère comme des barbares

I saw the movie at the Seattle Film Festival. The subject matter is relevant and intriguing from a social point of view - so the movie had the potential of being poignant and thought provoking. Instead, it feels as if the editor had been AWOL. The first hour and a half of the movie is peppered with irrelevant scenes, gratuitous coarse "humor" that is neither here nor there, and static shots with noise in the background (not unlike the time I accidentally hit record while pointing at the floor). Had it been a topic that I didn't have a personal interest in, I would have walked out of the theater after the first hour.

Surprisingly, the movie does end strongly. A good editing job could probably do wonders, producing a good 1 hour long movie. And that, in my book, would be preferable.

Mariana wants to direct a street show for the public depicting Romania's hand in the genocide of Romanian Jews during WWII. Her mentor and backer questions whether it is necessary, and maybe play up the heroics of the Romanian army in the war. That is the gist of the movie with the enormously long title.

The question is, why such a controversial theme? The Holocaust as illustrated in this picture will not play well here in a city with the largest Jewish population in the country. There is no question the Romanians have mastered the art of filmmaking; in fact, Lincoln Center hosted a Romanian Film Festival a few years ago. Noteworthy in this picture is an interesting back-and-forth between the two principals as they argue the philosophical and ethical pros and cons of the show, with some interesting historical references. As always, the actors are very natural and their competence is a feature of Romanian films.

It is worth your time and the ending packs an unexpected punch. It is not for everybody but it is the type of superior filmmaking you can expect in Romanian films.

7/10 - Website no longer prints my star rating.

Radu Jude's "Îmi este indiferent daca în istorie vom intra ca barbari" ("I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians" in English) does two things at once. The most important is that it looks at a shameful instance in Romania's history: the army's massacre of Jews in Bessarabia, even before the Nazis arrived (one of the Nazi officials even complained that the Romanian army was simply going ahead and killing Jews!).

But the other issue addressed is how Romania has treated this in years since. Romania, like the rest of Europe, wants to simply think that it was a victim of the Nazis; in reality - as in most of Europe's other countries - plenty of its citizens were delighted to help the Nazis.

The protagonist is a woman making a movie about the 1941 Odessa Massacre carried out by the Romanian army, with the title referring to a quote from Foreign Minister Mihai Antonescu. During the movie's production, a number of people start revealing their unwillingness to acknowledge the country's history. As someone notes, it's comforting to be the good guy.

It's not a masterpiece, but it still calls into question how much anyone is willing to recognize the bad parts of their own country's history. As John Quincy Adams once said, the historian must have no country (and the one character does even note the US's sordid history).

This film is a great feat, with a universal message regarding the difficulty in facing our true national images in the mirror, including savage, murderous episodes. Exquisite acting and art, as well as nuanced irony neatly combined with grave philosophising and serious storytelling. I was glued to the screen for the entire 2 hours and 20 minutes.

I saw many boring movies and I tolerated most of them and I have never put bad comments on them. But this is the most boring movie I have ever seen. Besides being boring it is also vulgar: many vulgar jokes and vulgar nudity scenes. Maybe this movie had a good idea, but it was implemented poorly.