By Chlotrudis Independent Film Society
Rating: 5 cats
Director: Radu Jude
Starring: Dana Marineci | Ivana Mladenovic | Lucian Teodor Rus | Serban Pavu
Original language title: Inimi cicatrizate
Country: belgium, france, germany, romania
Year: 2018
Running time: 141
IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5204020
Thom says: “I’m roaring around my brain trying to discover who recommended this superlative film fare to me. While Jude is an established director in Romania I’ve only seen one of his 7 other full-length fiction films AFERIM!, which didn’t spur me into seeking out his other films. This was adapted from the classic Romanian memoir novel of the same name by M. Blecher (he signed his letters with various first names starting with “M”), an autobiographical diary of his life in a sanatorium on the Black Sea Coast and while there are frequent scenes of the countryside and other excursions away from the sanatorium the bulk of the scenes are insular. Blecher spent his life from the age of 19 until his death at 29 being treated for bone tuberculosis. Patients with this horrible disease have to endure years of many excruciatingly painful treatments. There are ups and downs with the disease but that doesn’t stop Emanuel (the Blecher persona) from finding girl patients to have intercourse with, if they can find the right positions. He also makes friends with the other patients and has long discussions about life, the terrible political turmoil outside the sanatorium, & individual philosophies. While a little slow to reach its heights what initially won me over was the films streamlined framing as each scene was an amazing portrait shot with incredible detail attached to each scene; if activity is involved you can be certain that all most any detail is fascinating and stands alone. Patients die off or are transported to other facilities, but we never see Emanuel leave for good. But the epiphany that hit me was half way through the film I was prophetically reminded of Thomas Mann’s massive tome THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN which had the same explosive disquietude of that masterpiece. 5 cats“