Review of Tales from the Golden Age (2009) by Moniky R — 19 Jun 2012

The brainchild of Romanian director Cristian Mungiu, who also produced and wrote this film, he would direct one segment in this 5 part portmanteau film along with Hanno Höfer, Constantin Popescu, Ioana Uricaru and Razvan Marculescu.

This film shows the lighter side to Romania when it was in it's darkest days of Nicolae CeauÅescu's regime. It manages to be gently amusing and well made too. The first piece is The Legend of the Official Visit, where a rural town prepares for CeauÅescu passing through, and the plans that the Mayor (Teodor Corban), but it goes awry.

Then, in The Legend of the Party Photographer, there's a problem when a photographer (Avram Birau) gets a photo of CeauÅescu, which leads to a newspaper recall. In The Legend of the Chicken Driver, truck driver Grigore (Vlad Ivanov) makes a bit on the side by stealing eggs from the chickens he delivers.

In The Legend of the Greedy Policeman, a policeman Alexa (Ion Sapdaru) acquires a live pig, and tries to kill it for food, then in The Legend of the Air Sellers, Crina (Diana Cavallioti) and Bughi (Radu Iacoban) diddle people out of glass bottles and jars.

It's well made, and it's a good look at how people got by and prevailed in CeauÅescu's Romania, it was a simpler way of life, but it was one where people were brought down by this brutal regime.

Despite what people went though under CeauÅescu, it's a wonder there's any laughs in this film at all, but even though these tales are legends, they're still good to watch.