The time is the late 1980s. [Country: Romania, Belgium. Gabita (Laura Vasliu) is almost five months into an unwanted pregnancy and in meek desperation turns to her friend and roommate, Otilia (Anamaria Marinca) for help in organizing an illegal termination. This is a powerful film and a stark visual accomplishment, but no thanks to Gabita (Laura Vasiliu). Peter Bradshaw, ‘Review’, Guardian online, 11 Jan 2008, www.theguardian.com/film/2008/jan/ 11/worldcinema.drama (accessed 14 August 2013). A woman assists her friend in arranging an illegal abortion in 1980s Romania. And yet, according to Variety (online) just seven years later, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days was ‘further proof of Romania’s new prominence in the film world’ (2007).1 In fact, the film may be considered as indicative of a broader renaissance in Romanian cinema in the 2000s, particularly in light of other successful Romanian films, including Cristi Puiu’s The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005), which won the Prix un certain regard at the Cannes Film Festival, Corneliu Porumboiu’s 12:08 East of Bucharest (2006), which won the Camera d’Or at the Festival a year later, and Cristian Nemescu’s California Dreamin’ (2007), which won the Prix un certain regard at Cannes one year after that. As Xan Brooks remarked in his review of some of the best films of the first decade of the new millennium, the film comes with a ‘wider resonance – spotlighting the collective amnesia of those who lived through Ceausescu-era Romania and [who] are now keen to move on quickly, without a backward glance’ (2009). 1. We wonder how she has survived to her current 20-ish age in a society that obviously requires boldness, courage and improvisation. Mungiu’s second feature film follows the story of Otilia Mihartescu (Anamaria Marinca) and Gabriela ‘Gabita’ Dragut (Laura Vasiliu), two university friends in an unnamed Romanian town. Helps her so much, indeed, she does everything but have the abortion herself. Just click the "Edit page" button at the bottom of the page or learn more in the Synopsis submission guide.

And the goings-on of Otilia and Gabita's day will also make Otilia reflect on her relationship with Adi, from who she is receiving pressure to make an appearance at his mother's birthday dinner this evening, Adi's parents who she has yet to meet. I'll let you discover for yourself. Otilia is exasperated by Gabita’s lies, yet continues to help her and care for her. After visiting her boyfriend to borrow money, Otilia heads to a hotel where Gabita has booked a room, only to be informed by an unfriendly receptionist that there is no reservation under Gabita’s last name. Plot Keywords In Cristian Mungiu's "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days," Gabita desires an abortion, which was then illegal, not for moral reasons, but because Ceausescu wanted more subjects to rule. Analysis: Anne Jäckel wrote in 2000 that ‘[f]or all its long history, Romanian cinema has rarely been seen before’ (2000: 409). After much begging and haggling, they book a room at an expensive rate at a different hotel. One day in their life is presented, this day when Gabita hopes to get an abortion, which is illegal in Romania. She turns in desperation to her roommate Otilia, who agrees to help her, and does. The film is set in 1987, at the end of the oppressive Ceausescu regime. Romania still cringes under the brainless rule of Ceausescu. Patriarchal dominance in the form of medical men remind Otilia of the awful scene she has just left behind. Otilia grows exasperated with her selfish and self-obsessed friend, but she keeps on trying to help, even though she has problems of her own. Gabita Dragut and Otilia Mihartescu are friends and college roommates, they living in the coed dorm.

Showing all 3 items Jump to: Summaries (3) Summaries.

People who do that are incapable of understanding that to compromise would be a proof of their own love. Screenwriters: Cristian Mungiu and Razvan Radulescu. Gabita is perhaps the most clueless young woman ever to have the lead in a movie about her own pregnancy. The setting for this grippingly horrible movie is Romania, in 1987: that is, 2 years before Nicolae Ceausescu was executed, and 20 years after he had outlawed abortion in Romania to increase the birth rate. I'd send over Adi to collect my clothes.

Even though she tries to explain that she and Gabita have urgent personal business, he insists on Otilia coming to his house to meet his family that night. In the film’s closing sequence, Otilia looks at the camera, leaving the audience to decide what will happen to the two friends. Otilia has not even told her bourgeois boyfriend, fellow student Adi Radu, despite Otilia borrowing money from him for the many expenses. Otilia is relatively experienced with a steady boyfriend; Gabriela, by contrast, is naïve and vulnerable, misjudging most situations. There are no fancy shots, no effects, no quick cuts, and Mungiu and his cinematographer, Oleg Mutu, adhere to a rule of one shot per scene. He also referred to it as ‘part of that emerging twenty-first-century phenomenon, ordeal cinema: a cinema that with great formal technique makes you live through a horrendous experience in what seems like real time’ (2008).

Otilia reluctantly has sex with Mr Bebe so that he will not walk out on them, and eventually Gabita does as well. The process is fraught with potential problems as they are required to show and surrender their ID to anyone in authority for the asking, even to the hotel receptionists in their coming and going. Doru Pop, ‘The Grammar of the New Romanian Cinema’, Film and Media Studies, 3, 2010, 19–40. Mr Bebe discovers that Gabita’s claim that her pregnancy was in its third month is a lie; in fact, it has been at least four months.

Filmmakers in countries of the former Soviet bloc have been using their new freedom to tell at last the stories they couldn't tell then. And finally there is a closing scene where Otilia and Gabita agree to never refer to this night again. Anamaria Marinca gives a masterful performance as Otilia, but don't let my description of Gabita blind you to the brilliance of Laura Vasiliu's acting. | Taglines Producers: Daniel Burlac, Cristian Mungiu, Oleg Mutu, Alex Teodorescu. His name, by the way, is Mr. Bebe (Vlad Ivanov), and no, "bebe" is apparently not Romanian for "baby," but it looks suspicious to me. In Cristian Mungiu's "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days," Gabita desires an abortion, which was then illegal, not for moral reasons, but because Ceausescu wanted more subjects to rule. Even shots where the ostensible subject of the action is half-visible, or not seen at all, serve a purpose, by insisting on the context and the frame.

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. Production company: Mobra Films, Centrul National al Cinematografiei (CNC), Mindshare Media. Source Credits: The Routledge Encyclopedia of Films, Edited by Sarah Barrow, Sabine Haenni and John White, first published in 2015.

In a period of 24 hours, we follow the two friends in a journey of frustration, stupidity, duplicity, cruelty and desperation, set against a background of a nation where if it weren't for the black market, there'd be no market at all.

Those oppressive years seem to have shaped the world view of this director.

Peter Hames (ed.

A woman assists her friend in arranging an illegal abortion in 1980s Romania.

That almost sinks the arrangement: The abortionist has experience suggesting that hotel will be a safe venue, and suspects he may be set up for a police trap. Anamaria Marinca and Laura Vasiliu play Otilia and Gabriela (Gabita), two students in their early twenties who share a room in a provincial Romanian town. Mungiu shoots this scene in virtually one static tableau, with the family and neighbours crowded round the table, sneering at the irresponsibility of youth. A 1,290word film essay which analyzed the subjection and individual freedom of the female characters in the film "4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days."

Even if you think "Juno" was way too clever, two hours with Gabita will have you buying a ticket to Bucharest for Diablo Cody. Anne Jäckel, ‘France and Romanian Cinema, 1899–1999’, French Cultural Studies, 11, 33, 2000, 409–24. Xan Brooks, ‘Best Films of the Noughties’, Guardian online, 24 Dec 2009, www.theguardian.com/ film/filmblog/2009/dec/24/best-films-noughties-cristian-mungiu (accessed 14 August 2013). The movie deliberately levels an unblinking gaze at its subjects. ), The Cinema of Central Europe, London, Wallflower Press, 2004. These questions are eloquently suggested by Marinca’s stricken face, in an outstandingly subtle performance of utter distress. Editor [including sound]: Dana Bunescu. Otilia leaves Gabita at the hotel to go to her boyfriend’s mother’s birthday, but then returns to help Gabita dispose of the foetus. For example, when Otilia meets the pompous and patronising Bebe for the first time, he complains about the way in which the young women have misunderstood the furtive arrangements. The camera fixes on Otilia in his car, revealing her distress via her facial expression, while Bebe gets out to bully an old woman about her accommodation. Overall, the film reveals the end of innocence in a brutal tale of coming of age. For starters, she persuades Otilia to raise money for the operation.

She turns in desperation to her roommate Otilia, who agrees to help her, and does. The two women were certain that they would pay no more than 3,000 lei (equivalent to less than 10 pence in UK currency) for the abortion. Romania 1987, the era of the repressive Communist regime. Otilia is angry, with no way of expressing her anger. Romania, 1987, the brutal Ceausescu communist regime is in place; birth control is illegal and abortion is a crime punishable by death. Cast: Anamaria Marinca (Otilia), Laura Vasiliu (Ga˘bit¸a), Vlad Ivanov (Viarel ‘Domnu’ Bebe).]. For Gabita, the notion of taking responsibility for her own actions is completely unfamiliar. Her face shows that she has gone into shock, and yet has to keep things together for a birthday tea party. And yet, according to Variety (online) just seven years later, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days was ‘further proof of Romania’s new prominence in the film world’ (2007).1 In fact, the film may be considered as indicative of a broader renaissance in Romanian cinema in the 2000s, particularly in … I think it is inevitable.

Anne Jäckel wrote in 2000 that ‘[f]or all its long history, Romanian cinema has rarely been seen before’ (2000: 409).

She appears to wonder whether anyone would step up for her, the way she stepped up for her friend, after such a violation? When Gabita becomes pregnant, the two girls arrange a meeting with Mr Bebe (Vlad Ivanov) in a hotel, where he is to perform an illegal abortion. The bleakness of the storyline expresses a dark socio-political critique in the twilight years of a repressive dictatorship. One of them is her boyfriend Adi (Alex Potocean), who is himself so self-oriented that we wonder if Otilia is attracted to the type. The essay was part of a Philosophy course which was instructed by Professor Janna Van Grunsven Then she asks her to go first to meet the abortionist. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days is a lean, social realist masterpiece that put new Romanian cinema on the map and drew sharp attention to both the nastiness and kindness of human beings. The driving character is her roommate Otilia (Anamaria Marinca), who does all the heavy lifting. "The Lives of Others," for example, was about the East German secret police.

Even if you think ", AFI Fest 2020 Closes Out a Season of Reimagined Online Film Festivals, Bright Wall/Dark Room October 2020: I’m Happy To Disappoint You: A Gen X Girl’s Undying Love for Ellen Ripley by Kali White VanBaale, Memory House by Brazilian Director Joao Paulo Miranda Maria Wins the Roger Ebert Award at the 56th Chicago International Film Festival. The scene continues until an unexplained explosive noise is heard off-screen, and Bebe returns to Otilia. Helps her so much, indeed, she does everything but have the abortion herself. She has seen what humans are capable of, and she is left to wonder what protection she would have, were she to be in the same state.

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