Somewhere in the East

A poignant depiction of the early anti-communist resistance in Romania, the film captures the arrival of forced collectivization to a remote village in Transylvania during the 1950's and the heavy toll it takes on the social and family life of the peasants. Margineanu's style combines striking sequences of cinema verite (the brutal tactics of interrogation used by the secret police) with stylized depictions of human suffering and endurance. Interwoven throughout the film are the dramatic stories of the members of a wealthy farmer's family, who refuses to give up his land and livestock. A traditional family ethos clashes dramatically with the marauding and corrupt state bureaucracy. As a result, a complete generation of Romanian peasants and intellectuals is brutally wiped off and replaced with a "new" obedient and violent mass of half-wits.