gehle

I picked this movie out of curiosity at the Locarno film festival and was deeply touched by it's vibrant sincerity, the display of such a life-affirming power in an almost morbid surrounding and the tight final blink of hope. Saw it again in a small art-house cinema without any loss of this strong impression. Anything else is being said in the above comments, except that it is a shame that you hardly can get this movie anywhere, nor other works of this romanian genius L. Pintilie. Hints welcome. It makes a huge contrast to many disappointing experiences with "award"-laden movies of the well-established breed, garnished with acclaim which you find out are absolutely pointless. I consider myself not being prone to applaud art-house for art-house's sake though. This is a too-well hidden jewel.

There's a breed of German movies addressed to the younger public and I remember this one being particularly pretentious. Saw this with my son in the theatre yrs ago. There's no need to burning DVD's.

No one ever asked about it. It's rather about making big fuss about children, certain children's names. Bits of fun here and there, but being unrealistic (families, strange freak etc.) is definitely not excuseable by calling it a "modern fairy tale". Quite the most introductory literature books tell these way away from this plot. A lack of strong characters invented for children seems to be the predominant problem; it takes courage...