NewzTORONTO (AP) — The title of Cristian Mungiu’s previous film, “R.M.N.” — MRI in Romanian — is an apt metaphor for what Mungiu aims to do in his movies. Since his seminal 2008 abortion drama “4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days,” the Romanian filmmaker has loosely based his rigorously realistic films on real events, using them to explore the larger social forces shaping our world. It is not, anyone would grant, the easiest way to go about making movies.
“R.M.N.,” for instance, was based on a 2020 incident when Sri Lankan immigrant bakery workers were harassed in a rural Romanian village. It captured a familiar global clash involving tradition, migrants and xenophobia. The film even recreated, in one unbroken 17-minute take, a town hall meeting you can find on YouTube.
“I don’t like writing screenplays in which I try to invent a story starting from ideas,” Mungiu says. “My effort is to understand the things happening next to me.” Mungiu’s latest, “Fjord,” draws from a real 2015 episode in Norway. Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve star as a Christian couple with five children who have immigrated from Romania to Norway.
They are warmly welcomed by a progressive rural community, but their traditional and religious ways are increasingly scrutinized until their children are seized by the state. The film, which Neon opens in theaters Friday, has been widely celebrated. In May, it won the Palme d’Or, Mungiu’s second time winning the Cannes Film Festival’s top honor.
Romania has since selected “Fjord” as its Oscar entry for best international feature. But “Fjord” is also something unusual. It’s the rare art house movie to pose uncomfortable questions for largely left-leaning audiences.
Mungiu is himself politically liberal, but “Fjord” dramatizes a progressive brand of closed-mindedness and sanctimony that, he feels, rivals traits of the far right. “The extreme left behaves the same,” Mungiu said over coffee in a recent interview. “They are certain that they hold the truth.
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