A typical offshoot of the Romanian new wave was shot by Radu Muntean, who has so far mostly located the works of his films in urban environments. At the directorial evening of the Cannes Film Festival, this time Muntean (Tuesday After Christmas, One Floor Below) presented a naturalistic combination of thriller and drama set in the Transylvanian province. A group of humanitarians went to the villages in the mountains there, more precisely to an isolated village called Intregalde, which brings help to the poor every year on the eve of winter. For all of them, as if it is already a routine, they bring gifts every year anyway, and for three of them, Maria, Ilinac and Dana, this year’s action will be significantly different. Somewhere along the way they will pick up a disoriented and lost old man who needs transportation to the old sawmill.
Although they drive in a quality jeep, an SUV as created for these muddy forest and mountain roads, they will get stuck in the mud. An old man who turns out to be completely insane will walk on, and three people from the city will get stuck in the middle of nowhere. Maybe this short introduction sounds like the beginning of a Romanian version of “Hills Have Eyes” or a similar horror in which Transylvanian hilbili taslaki team from the city that wandered on their field, but Muntean decided to go in a much different direction. It is a film about three middle-class city people who are engaged in humanitarian work, but it is obvious that those from high, typically underestimating, look at the locals, the poor whom they help.
It quickly becomes clear to us that these are two completely different worlds that do not have so much contact, and in this cold, frozen, muddy and inaccessible terrain where there is not much help from modern technology to which it is probably accustomed, the city team will realize that at the mercy of the local rich. But who is actually the helpless rich man here when a situation like this happens is one of the questions that arises here. Of course, the development of the situation will lead to many clashes and open conflicts between the three humanitarians, and there will be serious disagreements between them over what should and how should be done. For those who have learned about American films in which there must be some classic action, “Intregalde” could be particularly problematic, but Muntean solidly presents this naturalistic almost doc drama from which everyone can draw their own conclusions. Rating 6.5 / 10.
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