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Mr. Lazarescu: nearing 63, lives alone with his three cats, underwent surgery due to ulcer, has a sister still living in Romania and a daughter who left (it seems) unannounced and moved to Canada. This is the man: old, alone and ill. A terrible fate.

Puiu's movie, inspired from true events (some years ago, a man was transported from one hospital to the other with a most tragic consequence) follows its protagonist through the final stages of his life: feeling ill, Lazarescu calls for an ambulance and awaits its (delayed) arrival drinking and making telephone calls. As the hands of the clock turn and the ambulance is nowhere to be heard or seen, the old man goes next door, trying to get some help from the neighbors: a stereotype of their kind. Once the ambulance finally arrives, Lazarescu embarks on a most dreadful road trip, from hospital to hospital, in an elaborate attempt to diagnose and operate him. The story begins.

It would be unfair not to acknowledge the film's authenticity from the outset. Truly segmented - as the director himself affirmed, regarding "Lazarescu" as the first in six stories about the Romanian capital - in several (short) "stories of Bucharest", we meet most intriguing characters and situations, each of them highly rewarding on different levels. Good doctors, bad doctors, grumpy doctors, snobbish doctors, pitiful doctors - all the guys and girls our great medical system can offer. Still, some continue to resemble human beings, which - to a certain degree - is quite an achievement.

The bad light Puiu sheds on them may be diminished by the fact that the night Lazarescu chose to fall ill was most unfortunate: a terrible car accident filled most of the hospitals so that it was extremely difficult to find a place for an old, drunk man who was automatically labeled as a drinker and treated as such. Few characters in the film show authentic sympathy for Lazarescu, as most of them just want to get on with the job and do themselves a greater good. There is no such concept of readiness to help a fellow man struggling between life and death: commodity reigns. Unlike Lazarus, our main character will most probably not rise from the dead. And the people who still stand and didn't give their everything are up to their throats in guilt.

But this is the terrible, depressing half of the story. A most regretful reality. Cristi Puiu's and Razvan Radulescu's (a bit overlong) script is at times filled with moments of sheer irony, sarcasm and cynicism, all worth their laughs. Some of these moments are brilliant. Lazarescu is witty and gutsy, as long as he can talk. He is a man who - despite what others think - wants to stand up for himself and would rather not let anyone treat him like scum. Sadly, though, all is part of a gigantic vicious circle: doctors remain people and patients are not at all different. Flawed. Yet, there is a question of humanity and dignity involved. A choice between what is right and what is easy, as the saying goes.

This movie is certainly not a comedy as some reviews claimed. This is a documentary-like shot movie about being old, lonely and dying. Dehumanization and absence of compassion are also two of the themes treated here. The story is focused on the context of Romanian hospitals, but this could be generalized to most social systems globally, i think. And my own experience of old people dying in hospitals here in Belgium is of course not so awful, but somehow related to Mr. Lazarescu's experience. And even the nice characters, who really try to help, don't really change anything to the poor guy's fate. So this movie is really deeply pessimistic. In my opinion, it was also a bit too long (about 150 min.) and definitely not easy-watching. But interesting and thought-provoking (and a bit depressing too...)

For anyone who has made a trip to or has accompanied a loved one to the emergency room, "The Death of Mr. Lazarescu" may be too realistic to bear.

A few years ago, my family called the ambulance for one of our relatives. He was having vague back pain -- we couldn't get him to communicate with us about it. He didn't want to go to the hospital, but his pain was too great for him not to. He is an alcoholic, and to this day lives under the assumption that none of us know he's an alcoholic, so I think his fear of the hospital had somewhat to do with the fear that his "secret" would be exposed. We ended up in a living hell of smug doctors, each with a different diagnosis of his condition, but who were all in agreement that the patient should be treated like dirt because of his addiction. If he wasn't going to care about his own health, they seemed to think, then why should they?

So needless to say, despite the fact that it takes place in Romania, "The Death of Mr. Lazarescu" hit frightfully close to home for me, as it's about a lonely, alcoholic man and his nighttime trip into the purgatory of emergency-room bureaucracy. The foreign setting aside, this film could have taken place in the USA and been no different. Nobody has time for Mr. Lazarescu, everyone has a different theory as to what is wrong with him, the nurses are more interested in making sure paperwork is filled out than they are in taking care of the living, breathing human being suffering -- and perhaps dying -- on the stretcher in front of them. In one scene, the doctors insult and belittle the ambulance nurse when she tries to offer her own assessment of Mr. Lazarescu's condition, holding their advanced schooling over and against her. We don't learn much about Mr. Lazarescu, and so we see events occur from the perspective of this paramedic who takes charge of him and carts him from one hospital to the next in a desperate attempt to find one that will treat him. To her, Mr. Lazarescu is a job, yet she's the closest thing to a caring relative he has, so cold and indifferent is the rest of the health care world.

This film is astonishing in its meticulous detail, and it's hard to believe it's not a documentary, something out of the world of Fredrick Wiseman. Most scenes are filmed in long takes, the camera standing back at an objective distance simply capturing the whirl of human activity taking place around it. The acting is amazing, for the very reason that no one seems to be acting. It's a deeply unsettling film; we know Mr. Lazarescu will likely die -- from cancer if not from the surgery he's about to undergo when the film closes, and anyway, the title tells us as much. But we don't see him die in the film -- the last scene is of him being washed, shaved and dressed for surgery, a human being reduced to a slab of living flesh on a table, robbed of even his last shred of dignity, while no one appears to care. Somehow, that lack of closure is one of the most unsettling things in the film; it captures the feeling one has when you've finally gotten your loved one to the hospital and all you can do is wait, not sure whether or not you're going to see him alive again.

Grade: A

Winner of the Un Certain Regard in Cannes, is like a version of "E.R" truly realistic, with the good, bad, indifferent, attentive, humble, arrogant, and, above all, human doctors. The title-character is far from being a hero, but that makes it easier to sympathize with him, which is essential here: we really feel like we were Lazarescus, going from hospital to hospital waiting for the help, never being treated properly, and the situation getting worse and worse as times goes by. Puiu's creates a documentary-like atmosphere to an almost Kafka-like situation, and fills the movie with dark humor and moments which can be shocking, but are never there just for that purpose. The entire cast delivers solid performances, specially Fiscuteanu as the remarkable Lazarescu Dante Remus and Luminita Gheorghiu as the paramedic. Reminded me of Hitchcock's "The Wrong Man" (one of his best and certainly the most overlooked), another documentary-like film about a man in a absurd, but also realistic, situation in a system that doesn't care about him. One of the best pictures of 2005.

This is one of those movies that you remember because it was different from any other. Well, the Anglo-Saxon viewers will probably remember Bringing Out the Dead with Nicholas Cage and find similarities. But this is not a film that focuses on the characters, but on the system, the people are ordinary people with ordinary needs and flaws, working inside a system that itself is not perfect.

Don't get me wrong, this is not a movie that wants to shock by presenting horrible flaws in a medical system we all need to trust, it is a film that presents the system close to reality, maybe even in a better light than most of us Romanians see it, and still flawed.

The story itself is based on a true event and the end is completely non judgemental. You get to see it and think about it, that is it. The true beauty of the film is the normality of every situation, the calm or unrest of people that is completely ordinary and the way it drags the subject of the movie (Lazarescu himself) from a sickly lonely old man, but otherwise a normal human being, to the end.

I think it is a good film overall, a great film as Romanian films are concerned, and also a good watch for non Romanians as well.

Shown at the New York and Chicago film festivals, October 2005. A Tartan Films release in the US, limited release scheduled for May 2006.

Puiu was inspired at nineteen by Jim Jarmusch's "Stanger Than Paradise" to become a filmmaker. He says "ER" is syndicated in Rumania: "When you watch the American show, there's movement in every direction, the choreography of the characters is amazing -- but I can't believe any of it." In "Mr. Lazarescu" Puiu does an "ER," Rumanian style. There's movement in only one direction -- following sixty-something Lazarescu, a drinker with a sore belly and a terrible headache, on a Saturday night in Bucharest when there has been a bad bus accident, after he calls 911. Puiu throws out hints of profundity with names in the script like Lazarus, Virgil, Dante, Remus, and Angel; and the trek from hospital to hospital as Lazarescu's diagnosis changes and his condition worsens can be seen as a journey through Hell. But the film didn't win the Un Certain Regard top prize at Cannes this year because of any message. It's Puiu's attention to detail, the precise planning of dialog and camera positions that gives a sense of documentary accuracy to the action and makes the film compulsively watchable and somehow unique and yet universal.

A splendid movie. Probably one of the top five selections of the New York Film Festival. There is much that can be said about it but really only one thing need be said: see it as soon as you can. Watch for a DVD release.

It's amazing to see this movie rated as comedy, and reading other people's comments I see the reasons it's so well rated differently. This movie it's a hard to swallow. Not comedy, maybe drama, supra-realistic. It's incredible for most of the people in most civilized countries that what you see there is what happens as a routine in Romania. No wonder Romania's minister of health didn't want to be present at the premiere in Bucharest. This movie is a very realistic reflection of what old or seek people get in Bucharest after paying their medical assurances for a lifetime. Of course it's a movie and there are also side aspects; but seeing the action.. it was nothing new for me. I've been through it with someone very dear to me, and i know what's happening in those hospitals.

Indeed, this movie means a lot more than it seems to.

It is not only about a poor sanitary system. It is also about old age, loneliness, illness, about physical and mental degradation. It is about major as well as minor facts of life, about keeping the human feelings despite of hostile conditions. It is about obedience and dignity. It is about love and care. About bed luck, when it comes, about how to face it.

It is not a documentary; it is not a mass media investigation. It is an art movie, and if it was only about the sanitary system, such a gifted artist like Cristi Puiu shouldn't bother at all. Besides, you know, it is not only about what you say, it is a lot about how you say it. Just have a look and see a great screen play, a great director and great, great, great actors.

I found this title on a list of outstanding foreign films. It tells the story of a man who has been forgotten, who would like to live, but who is seen as a burden to all those who he encounters. He has had ulcer surgery and apparently other serious, probably fatal ailments. He makes calls to his "loved ones." He tries to navigate his apartment, but is overwhelmed because of pain and weakness. A neighbor grudgingly tries to help him but feels the need to lecture him. It is apparent that he has had issues with alcohol in the past and is quite acerbic. Eventually, he put in an ambulance and a journey from hospital to hospital begins. At no point do the care givers treat him with simple humanity. The paramedic, a tired woman, tries to see to hits needs and get him care, but she is often rebuffed by doctors and hospital personnel. This is gut wrenching and we feel the vicarious pain. He has ceased to be of value in this society. The closing scene is very hard to watch.

Compassionate and detailed study of the final hours of the eponymous lonely inebriate. The two and a half hours of hand-held camera irritated me from time to time, but the performances, especially the central duo - Ion Fiscuteanu as Lazarescu, Luminata Gherghiu as the unfortunate nurse who calls to treat him - pulled me back in without much trouble. There's also a basic mismatch between the documentary style and the thuddingly fictional stumbling blocks that happen along the way, but in the end the galaxy of humanity on display, and the bitter truth that this is, mostly, how we end up, gives this film a strange dignity. I say strange, because it achieves this dignity even though it depicts a character's protracted decline from an already low point. "King Lear" it obviously isn't, nor does it set out to be, but there is something Shakespearean here in the observation of a wide range of types, as well as a deep understanding of the human condition.

In the mood for two and a half hours of agonizing torture? I know there are masochists out in the world who have a need to suffer. Here is the perfect solution; a Romanian "dark comedy" in the style of The Hospital from 1971. Both deal with medical mistakes, but the American satire focused on a doctor played by George C. Scott, and this time it is a patient, the unfortunate Mr. Lazarescu, who is the victim of a health care nightmare.

Mr. L. lives in his apartment alone with his cats, when he begins to experience severe stomach pains. He calls for an ambulance, and after a long wait, he asks a neighbor for help. They discover that he drinks a homemade booze that is causing most of his problems. He is taken from one hospital to the next, and by the time he reaches the third one, he is unconscious. A major bus accident causes chaos, filling the emergency rooms with other patients. Meanwhile the doctors are indifferent to Lazarezcu's suffering. There is no happy ending in this marathon of misery, and although it is very realistic, almost looking like a documentary, I needed some of that homemade hooch, by the time it was over.

Forty years after the last big prize received by Liviu Ciulei, director Cristi Puiu is back in the Cannes festival list of prizes with this strong but sensible creation. A new generation of Romanian cinema makers is born, and it not only succeeds in making a strong statement about the situation in today's Romania, but does it in a way that makes sense for international audiences.

There are three levels one can see Puiu's film. The first is the relation between the single human and the medical system. 'Moartea domnului Lazarescu' is the anti-'ER' with the universal character of the paternal doctor, playing God just to hide his own lack of competence and his indifference is kind of universal.

Then we have the story of Dante (yes!) Lazarescu descending in five hours the spiral stairs between being a pauper drunken in today's Bucharest towards almost certain physical death. An yet, despite the gradual physical degradation admirably acted by Ion Fiscuteanu, Mr. Lazarescu keeps intact his moral and human dignity, even as he slowly slides into a comma.

I am not sure whether folks who did not live in Romania or other former communist countries will catch easily the third layer. Lazarescu lives in a world in decomposition. Dictature is gone, but no social help system replaced it, his family is far away, his neighbors are simple people, indifferent and hardly coping with their own problem. Yet, in this decrepit medium he will find in the assistant Mioara a caring person, who will not only try to save him, but will ease his last hours with the feeling that yet there is somebody who cared for him. It's not quality of life, it's more - quality of humanity.

I thought the film, above all was a brilliantly crafted, perfectly paced film. Its narrative was so well developed that the film, like life, lent itself to a lot of interpretation. What I found most intriguing was the power dynamics in the whole medial system and then by extension in the society. The colourful old man with his cats in his apartment is the king to start off with. He has supreme authority, he's the owner of the house. He enjoys freedom to drink, to live the way he wants, and he's not about to entertain anybody's objections to the way he lives his own life. The moment he requires someone else's help, he loses his authority. The neighbour who's better than him is now in control. then the nurse, then the doctors, then the doctors, then the doctors. every time as one person loses his authority, Mr. lasarescue becomes more and more insignificant. because he becomes more and more dependent. By the end of it, he becomes so insignificant, that when he's lying limp on the stretcher, stripped naked, the camera holds him for a moment, and then, it does not even matter whether he's dead or alive. The entire process, his entire journey in the film is a constantly gradual degradation of his independence, his freedom and his dignity as a person, as a human being. This entire journey is the death of his personality, his significance. This is The Death of Mr. Lasarescue.

Can't wait to see more from this director!

I just want to respond the first comment (or at least the comment marked as "most useful"), saying that this is not a movie about reality on a post-Comunist country. This is a movie about reality in countries that don't belong to the first Word. I come from Argentina, and my country has never been run as a communist country. Every president we had might have had politics different than other countries, but certainly, never even *near* communism. And that *happens*. It happens *every single day*. Do you know why I didn't enjoyed that movie? Because I couldn't stop thinking that at least half of the population in my country has no chance but to assist to public hospitals and suffer that luck *every day*. I'm lucky I belong to a middle class that can afford private hospitals, but as I see on the news, people go to hospitals at five in the morning to ask for an appointment with a doctor. And I see how doctors who work at public hospitals are frustrated when they can't help their patients because hospital doesn't have the appropriate equipment. It's really sad. It's not post-communism. It's reality at third word countries (and third word doesn't always mean we are from the African country where they are all starving, cause we are doing just fine. We're not that bad.) And the reason these countries have this issues is because, well, like you've seen our economy minister saying it on TV, the big boys are trying to keep us down.

I do hope that The Death of Mr. Lazarescu has changed something in our head. It's not just a movie, It's almost a documentary... Because i can assure you that is a real story. Not a reality show, a real story.

The film has been awarded a Prize in the "Un certain regard" category during the 2005 Cannes Festival. It is indeed a certain look at the Romanian contemporary society that Cristi Puiu proposes here. It would made an excellent documentary on the current and depressing state of the the Romanian medical system and medical staff psyche. Having lived in Romania, long enough I can assure you, the movie really sticks to the reality. Acting is excellent. Just two complaints from my behalf. The topic is depressing enough and Romania's image abroad bad enough not to overemphasize it by the dim and dull lightning of the scenes. Two hours and a half might be a bit challenging for the audience, even in Romania (I've seen Romanian viewers walking out of the theater). Two hours would have been enough to get the message and the feel of it.

The medical system, if you want to call it that, because there's nothing really systematic about it, is savagely explored in the curiously interesting " Death Of Mister Lazarescu", a movie that I'm liking more and more now that I think back on what I saw. Essentially following a hellish night of a lout who gets head and chest pains and then dares to call the ambulance and better yet, dares to go to a hospital. I kind of wonder about this exposure of the medical system, even though it does take place in Romania, whether the same thing could happen here, eg, the type of medical care largely depends on your social class and whether you have enough money or not. Having said that. The lead actor, one Ion Fiscuteanu, is simply phenomenal in the title role as a belligerent old drunk who rather grudgingly goes to the hospital, and as he gets shuffled from hospital to hospital (largely because of a bus accident that swamped many of the E.Rs in the city, becomes less and less communicative… What a show, and what heartless people the hospital people are! Not just to the patient, who can't stop commenting about his drinking, but also to the EMT's, who dare to offer medical opinions but then are shot down because "they are'nt doctors". OUCH! What a show! If you ever get a chance, try to go see this one.

My partner rented this through Netflix (we miss so many small films that race through town). I didn't know what to expect, but he _thought_ that it was going to be a comedy. It is not. There are no extras to help you figure out anything: a true 'no frills' DVD. No music soundtrack during the film, no English in the credits in case you want to knowwhat the one song at the beginning and the one song at the end were. In any case, I heard that the director was inspired by ER and wanted to make a Romanian version. That's a very good comparison--it's like a two & half hour ER episode with the little side stories and everything. Intensely grim, though. Naturalistic almost to the point of pain, as though you truly were just watching Life unfold...or rather, Death. Don't know how the director got those performances out of his actors. They are completely unconscious of the camera. It's unnerving, if you can last the whole length of the film.

This film was advertised as a black comedy. But it is much 'blacker than a black comedy'. The most funny part is probably at the beginning with Mr. Lazarescu's neighbours around.

The pace of the film is quite slow. The content is very narrative and down to earth. It's the outstanding performance from the protagonists that bolsters up the whole film.

Apart from the good acting, the director also delivers a realistic view on the relationship between doctors and nurses, and between doctors and patients in a medical system. This is very different from the mainstream TV series e.g. ER, House or Hollywood films that usually treat doctors like god or hero. It mirrors a growing problems in a health care system across the world. But interestingly this rather universal phenomenon on the hierarchy in a health system is documented so well by Romanian.

This slow, painfully repetitive, poorly written (and/or translated) film is one of the worst films i've ever seen. Billed as a "black comedy" it wasn't black or comical. The story (if you can call it that) takes forever to develop and then it repeats itself over and over with the exact same dialog and character stereotypes in each scene. All shot with a hand-held video camera and cast with horrible actors, each scene is so amateurish that I had to keep watching because I couldn't believe that it kept getting progressively worse. How this movie ever got made or distributed is a mystery to me. And I believe this is nominated for a best foreign language feature academy award??? Am I missing something?

Lonely, retired Mr. Lazarescu becomes ill one night. His neighbors call an ambulance, and he's taken on a bizarre tour of Bucharest's hospitals, each of which shuffles him over to the next.

I can understand the negative reviews here. By necessity, THE DEATH of MR. LAZARESCU is bleak, repetitive, and confined in settings. I can also understand its being a labeled a comedy, though it's one of the very darkest sort. While definitely not for those who want fast action, sophisticated effects, and/or just something really fun and uplifting, the acting is so natural and the cinematography so plainly real that DML becomes one of those films that will completely immerse a willing audience.

As a satire of medical care for the poor, aged, and unconnected, there's nothing more effective. Using simple narrative, it shows what so many recent documentaries have merely tried to show. While set in a small Eastern European nation, it's likely to strike a chord just about anywhere. Though non-Romanian audiences may have to do some quick look-ups and online translations, there is clever symbolism--more subtle but just as apt as the name of the protagonist--in the names of the doctors, nurses, and facilities.