Please join the East Central European Center at the Harriman Instiute
for a special SCREENING OF THE ROMANIAN FILM “AFERIM!” (2015),
introduced by Professor Mona Momescu and followed by a discussion.
Described by Sheri Linden in the Los Angles Times as “a wickedly
droll ride into Romania’s feudal past,” AFERIM! goes beyond the
mere Western perception of a remote time in the history of a forlorn
country. Equally, it is not a product made for the expectations of the
Western audience, as they are imagined by Romanian filmmakers of the
last two decades. The film is directed by Radu Jude with
cinematography by Marius Panduru. A local warden-turned-bounty-hunter
takes his young son on an expedition to catch a runaway Roma slave who
allegedly had an affair with his master’s wife. The runaway is
caught, and as the three men travel back to where the slave will be
subjected to capital punishment by his dishonored master, a strange
and unspoken fraternity develops between them, across social classes,
prejudice, and various forms of slavery. The film is a
rarely-seen-before analysis of the Phanariotes age (late 1700s to the
1830s) in the Romanian principalities. Turkish, Greek and Romanian
administrators act in a cacophony of rules, while ordinary people have
to abide. Roma slaves and the wives of aristocrats alike suffer a lack
of freedom and the fear of being disposable objects at the mercy of
the “master and ruler of the house.” Petty clerks perpetuate the
same abusive behavior against those who are defenseless, collecting
absurd taxes. Byzantinism, which existed well into the late 1800s in
Romanian society, permits this all to proceed unquestioned— this is
fate! The only exception to this chaos is the plethora of rhymed
Romanian lore, which the characters fall back on to make sense of
their lives. Again, it is the rhetoric of Byzantium and of the
Balkans. Filmed in black and white, AFERIM! (which ironically
translates as “well done/bravo/kudos”) stands as one of the major
accomplishments of the Romanian cinema in the last decade. Event
Contact Information: Carly Jackson 212 854 6217 crj2116@columbia.edu
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31/01/2020 Last update