Romanian Film Review - Not just sarmale: eclectic holidays viewings

Christmas is around the (nearest) corner and with it the days up to New Year’s, a daze of food (mainly the eponymous meat-filled cabbage rolls), family, friends, and (hopefully for as many as possible) no work. Also a time to catch up on movies. Here are a few to pass these weeks, some are for free, so make sure to scroll down, and for the others I include their respective streaming site/ TV channel.

Bogdan Mureșanu’s The New Year That Never Came/ Anul Nou care n-a fost (on Netflix and HBO) is the first and most recent title that sprang to my mind. The interconnecting stories leading up to the Revolution of 1989 are handsomely and assuredly done, culminating in a riotous ending. It includes the director’s previous short film, The Christmas Gift/ Cadoul de Crăciun in its entirety, more or less. And I prefer the short, it is much more focused, and also turns out to be the feature’s funniest bit: a potentially disastrously honest letter a child writes to Santa, unleashing familial drama and propelling the father (a fantastic Adrian Văncică) into pure frenzy. No wonder it snatched all possible audience and critics’ awards.