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12:08 EAST OF BUCHAREST
Written, Produced & Directed by: Corneliu Porumboiu.
Director of Photography: Marius Panduru.
Edited by: Roxana Szel.
Music by: Rotaria.
Released by: Tartan Films.
Language: Romanian with English subtitles.
Country of Origin: Romania. 89 min. Not Rated.
With: Mircea Andreescu, Teo Corban & Ion Sapdaru.

Romanian independent cinema has grabbed the international spotlight. Last month, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days won the Golden Palm at this year’s Cannes; The Death of Mr. Lazarescu, the “Un Certain Regard Award” in 2005; and the winner for best first film in 2006 arrives today.

A comedic clash between the present and the past, 12:08 East of Bucharest’s centerpiece is a no-budget television interview program, which goes off the tracks. (It looks like any public access program from the ‘80s.) On the 16th anniversary of the fall of dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, host Jderescu (Teo Corban) sets out to examine the role his sleepy burg (the town remains nameless) played in the overthrown of the hard-line communist leader. (Ceausescu fled from the capitol via helicopter at 12:08 pm, December 22, 1989 – this revolution was televised.)

Filmed in real time, the unraveling call-in program is a comedy of embarrassment (The Office, without the asides to the camera, but just as dry). Humor derives from the wobbly, amateurish camera (apparently the studio’s tripod doesn’t work), the unguarded moments caught on camera, and more importantly, the actors’ precise timing. Like Lazarescu, there’s a sense that what plays out on camera is spontaneous, though both films are obviously well-structured.

The film first straightforwardly and drolly covers the first half of the day, as one scheduled guest cancels, then another. Searching for replacements, the self-important Jderescu scrounges around (and perhaps scrapes the bottom), finding old-timer Piscoci (Mircea Andreescu), the town’s go-to Santa, and high school history teacher Manescu (Ion Sapdaru), who’s first seen hungover on his living room couch, on the outs again with his penny-pinching wife. A boozer and a sponger, he seems to owe everyone in town money.

Bucharest shares with Lazarescu a detached point of view, made up of long, mostly static, uninterrupted takes, a staple in art house cinema, especially in Europe (though Bucharest’s writer/director Corneliu Porumboiu credits Jim Jarmusch as an influence). While the style is deceptively simple and austere, neither film would have garnered such acclaim had it not been for the strong acting. Kent Turner
June 6, 2007