An Ealing type culture clash comedy; swapping sophisticated urbanites versus yokels, for Westerners versus Eastern Europeans. Set during the Kosovo war of 1999, this clever allegory for a country (Romania) corrupted by decades of Communism following years of Nazi alliance/occupation. A state going through the painful transition from a forced commitment to dialectical materialism, on towards tentative democracy.
The battle lines here are drawn between factory workers who go to work simply to strike; local village girls who want the visiting US Marines to take them to America away from their boring village; and, a local warlord who uses corrupt local police to help enrich himself (& help keep him so) while keeping his fellow villagers poor. Much of the humor comes from a bureaucracy gone mad; being swept away in political and social reforms opposed by those who fear both change and independent nationhood.
The casting is excellent. The ever dependable Armand ASSANTE plays the exasperated military intelligence captain against Razvan VASILESCU as the pedantic, documentation obsessed stationmaster. The latter thoroughly enjoying the fact that he can stop a US military shipment because he disagrees with the US military intervention in Kosovo. Maria DINULESCU also scores highly as the man mad village girl attracted to the US Marine who looks like Ricky Martin.
The only real problem this film has is its length – but it would be hard to know what should be included in the Deleted Scenes.
Copyright © 2009 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://franktalker5.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.
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