04/04/2017 - 2017 will welcome an extensive rejuvenation of Romanian cinema

Established filmmakers are virtually staying silent in Romania, leaving the stage empty for first-time directors: as many as eight debut features are expected to be released or at least to end post-production in 2017, marking an extensive rejuvenation of the local film landscape. Not only is the number of these first features impressive, but also their range of new topics and the inventive way in which they challenge the tropes of the so-called Romanian New Wave.  

The first to hit screens was Anca Miruna Lăzărescu’s That Trip We Took with Dad [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Anca Miruna Lazarescu
film profile], an ambitious co-production following the adventurous journey of a family from the Romanian city of Arad to West Germany in 1968. Ivana Mladenovic’s The Soldiers also explores groundbreaking territory: a doomed gay love story between a university graduate writing his PhD thesis and a former convict living in the Roma neighbourhood in Bucharest.

Religious vocation and innocence will be explored in Daniel Sandu’s One Step behind the Seraphim [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Daniel Sandu
film profile], a film about several teenagers studying to become priests in a church-administered high school. Meanwhile, family ties and the challenges of adoption are at the centre of Emanuel Pârvu’s Meda or the Not So Bright Side of Things (see the news).

Love, loss and unfaithfulness are the backbone of Andrei Creţulescu’s Charleston (see the news), a drama about a widower who is approached by his deceased wife’s lover in order to overcome the grief caused by the woman’s demise. An analysis of the preconceptions we have about intimacy and the surprising ways it can be achieved, Adina Pintilie’s Touch Me Not [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Adina Pintilie
film profile] is expected to end post-production this year. 

Cristi Iftime’s Mariţa (see the news), a story about a family reunion that doesn’t go exactly as planned, has recently wrapped post-production. Finally, Mihaela Popescu’s Yet to Rule [+see also:
trailer
film profile], a surrealist drama in which two actors (Dorotheea Petre and Cuzin Toma) play the same character, a judge, will also be finished this year.