The Oak. - movie reviews

National Review, March 1, 1993 by John Simon

And also note the sensitively understated cinematography of Doru Mitran in, for example, the gorgeous backward-tracking shot at the end of Nela's last visit to her ailing mother, where the camera seems to take discreet leave of the dying old woman as, supported by Nela, she moves down an alley of trees in the opposite direction. The scene is bathed in an unearthly wash of blue, as if Mother were fading into Heaven.

All performances are fine, but the two leads are spectacular. Maia Morgenstern is of the family of such rawboned, powerful actresses as Christine Lahti and Sigourney Weaver, with the added zaniness of a Mary Steenburgen, and the veiled sexiness of a Kathy Baker. Her beauty sneaks up on you, then ambushes you with frightening intensity. She acts from the bottom of her being--even her quiet moments seem to be eruptions shot in slow motion. There is passion in her wit, wit in her passion; can you ask for more? As for Razvan Vasilescu, he has one of those slightly crooked, sly, almost homely faces that light up with intelligence, humor, and a perverse joy of living just when every hurdle is higher than the last. There is a restless alertness about his gaze from behind narrowed lids, a quickness of comprehension one jump ahead of everybody else's. Without the least effort to please, these two compel you to root for them with all your being.

Lucian Pintilie, now 59, made this film in 1991. His persona contains elements of both Mitica and Nela. He has done distinguished work in Rumanian film, theater, and television, and had the honor of being repeatedly censored by Ceausescu himself. With his first film, Sunday at Six, and especially the second, The Reconstruction, he demonstrated (in Mira and Antonin Liehm's phrase, in their book The Most Important Art) "that Rumanian film finally had a director of international stature." His stage production of The Inspector General was banned after three performances; his 1979 film, Carnival Scenes, could not be shown till 1991; finally Ceausescu personally saw to it, with sarcastic politeness, that Pintilie be granted his exit passport. For 17 years he lived in France and America, directing controversial stage productions. Now he's back in charge of Rumanian film production with the suitably operettaish title Director of the Cinema Creation Studio of the Ministry of Rumanian Culture.

I could detect only one false step in The Oak: some time after death, Titi's corpse still shows no sign of rigor mortis. But even that may have been right in Rumania: where every sort of rigor besets the living, how could death be anything but a loosening?