Breaking News

Romanian cinema has been gaining international recognition over the past decade for its authenticity and original style. Many of the films portray daily life under under the previous communist regime, such as Cristian Mungiu’s 4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days. Others such as Corneliu Porumboiu’s 12:08 East of Bucharest or Catalin Mitulescu’s How I Celebrated The End Of The World look at the 1989 Revolution and the execution of Nicolae Ceausescu (and his wife).

There is a certain sense of “miserablism” in the austere aesthetic of many of the current offerings, none more so than in Breaking News by Iulia Rugin?, her third film, which deals with a human story rather than making political points.

In the opening moments a television cameraman is tragically killed, while he and his reporter are investigating a boiler explosion in a factory. Although the survivor (played by Andi Vasluianu) is still trying to recuperate, both mentally and physically, he is assigned to shooting a video documentary about his colleague.

Over three bleak days in the run-up to Christmas, he tries to inveigle the man’s family into co-operating with the project to little effect. He meets the man’s rebellious teenage daughter who is also struggling with the death of her father, and eventually she agrees to co-operate to a degree. Meanwhile his own family back home in Bucharest resent his absences and his introverted obsession with his late colleague.

His investigations turn up the private side of a man he saw every day at work but knew so little about his personal life and struggles.

The jigsaw has been meticulously piece together by Rugin? who uses the world of television and news gathering simply as a backdrop to explore family issues from the inside. It is as gripping and involving a piece of cinema to come out of Romania in a fair while.