Tales from the Golden Age (2009) by a few Romanian directors under the supervision of Cristian Mungiu
The final 15 years of the Ceausescu regime were the worst in Romania’s history. So of course, the propaganda machine of that time decided to refer to that period as “the golden age”. Now, if humor is what kept Romanians alive under Ceausescu, then Tales from The Golden Age captures that mood perfectly.
The film is a collection of five cine-sketches, each story portraying a different aspect of every day life in Romania under the hated regime. It’s mainly about the survival of a nation having to face the totally absurd and twisted logic of a dictatorship.
I’m not familiar with the new wave of Romanian cinema (most notably Cristian Mungiu’s critically acclaimed 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and Cristi Puiu’s The Death of Mr Lazarescu), but I hear that Tales from The Golden Age stands out as a more commercial attempt to reach a wider international audience.
But even though the comedy in the film feels quite light and no matter how funny and farcical you find each situation, you never lose sight of how fucking sad it all is.
Check out the trailer
Check out Philip French’s review in The Guardian
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More detailed synopsis + some personal rambling:
> Story one: The Legend of the Official Visit:
“… about a village preparing frantically to Potemkinise their dismal community before the arrival of a party bigwig, but when an underling arrives to say that the visit is cancelled, everyone piles on to a fairground carousel swing in a mood of delirious relief. Too late, they realise they can’t stop, because no one can reach the off button – they must just whirl on until the machine runs out of fuel 12 hours later: a great image for incompetence, insincerity and an eternity of desperation.” — Philip French, The Guardian
In fact: on the occasion of Ceausescu’s working visits, countryside mayors ended up hanging fruit in trees to make sure their villages would be noticed, obeying even the strangest orders from the ferocious Party activists (at one point in the story, when the mayor is showing the Party Inspector some pigeons, explaining that he’d make them fly as a welcome to the official escort, the inspector gave him a bored look and said “make them white”).
> Story two: The Legend of the Party Photographer:
An official photo-retoucher has the job of making Ceausescu look as tall and imposing as Giscard d’Estaing during that pre-Photoshop era. Then he had to make him wear a hat. And do that in time for the newspapers to hit the stands the next morning. At some point, someone actually shouted “Stop the presses”… Yes, you guessed as much: serious cock-up and hilarity ensued.
In fact: communist party secret regulations stated that in official pictures, President Ceausescu couldn’t take his hat off in front of the representatives of the rotten capitalistic world.
On a more personal note: I seriously felt for that poor pre-press guy as he collapsed in his chair, clutching his chest, after someone had shown him the photo cock-up on the front page of the newspaper. This story particularly touched me for I’ve experienced this sort of situation first hand in places like Russia and Uzbekistan, and, believe me, just like the protagonists in the story, I wasn’t laughing then.
> Story three: The Legend of the Chicken Driver:
This one is rather tragic. A truck driver has the task of trucking chickens across country in food-strapped Romania, under strict orders not to stop. But then, there’s this woman he lusts for and want to impress with chicken eggs. And that’s when things go bad.
> Story four: The Legend of the Greedy Policeman:
A cop scores a pig from his brother-in-law. All OK so far. Except that the pig is brought to him alive. Now, the problem for our cop is to find a way to slaughter the pig discretely so as not to alert the neighbours to his pork supply. So of course, he choses to gas the animal in his kitchen”…I’d personally re-title this story “pig explosion”.
> Story five: The Legend of the Air Sellers:
A couple of students embark on a confidence scam to part people from glass bottles, which can be sold for cash. The “bottled air” scam is quite ingenious actually but only made possible by the absurdity of life under Ceausescu.
Myth: rumor has it that, in the golden age, a lot of Romanians purchased their cars by reselling empty bottles.
