Romanian cinema has brought us a lot of good and interesting things in the 21st century, and we will see if a man named Octav Chelaru will follow the path of his famous and famous compatriots. “Balaur” or “A Higher Law” was the debut feature film for this author born in 1991 and immediately showed Chelar that he is an exceptional talent. He made a really good combination of thriller and drama, a mature, smart and brilliantly thought-out social and character study that had eight nominations in the selection for the Romanian film of the year.
It is a film that in style, aesthetics and subject matter is largely based on the Romanian new wave, a naturalistic and realistic drama in which the center of attention is a woman in her late thirties who seems to be stuck in a life and marriage that seems to be suffocating her. In the opening scene, we see Ecaterina (Malina Manovici) jogging through the forest to the place where she hides cigarettes under a rock. We will understand that this introductory detail symbolizes her almost complete lack of freedom, adapting to others and suppressing what she would like. And this religious teacher in high school would certainly like more than what her conservative husband, priest Dragoš (Alexandru Papadopol) offers her.
Although she teaches religious education in a small Romanian town, and her 16-year-old son Florin is among the students, it seems that Ecaterina encourages her students to debate and think, to question Christian dogmas. It seems more like philosophy classes and she discusses with a few active students about free will and predestination, about the meaning of life, whether a person can resist temptations, and she herself will soon find herself in a great temptation. But before that we will understand how Ecaterina feels. As a feeling of guilt constantly creeps up on her, whatever she does is wrong, and some sins from the long past are eternally thrust into her nose. She is desperate and insecure, humiliated and frustrated, she even begins to believe that everything that is said about her is really true.
But when a new student arrives in her class, 16-year-old Iuliu, a returnee from Germany who supposedly lives with his grandmother, this whole story will get an unexpected twist. This apparently charming teenager, whom we will understand to be anything but harmless, will start provoking Ecaterina, even attacking her openly. He will contradict her in class, challenge and criticize some religious dogmas, and the situation will very quickly get completely out of control. And Ekaterina’s faith will not only be put to the test, but against a kind of emotional and psychological prison in which she is stuck, she will react in a completely atypical way.
A woman who has obviously been charged with some kind of guilt all her life and everyone told her what to do and how, but she tried her best and kept silent and kept herself imposed and behaved the way she was forced to do, now she will do something completely unexpected for her. Even she herself will find her behavior surprising and shocking, but the brilliant young Chelaru builds the relationship between her and her husband and we see in numerous details how she feels. Manovici is great as a woman who will deviate from the path set for her, and the psychological drama “A Higher Law” will turn into a surprisingly good thriller and a more than pleasant and unexpected surprise.
