After an altercation at his job in Germany, Matthias returns to his parents’ mountain village in Transylvania to find that his estranged wife has grown more distant and his young son has stopped talking. As these personal struggles unfold, tensions within the village’s community intensify after a small group of Sri Lankan migrants are hired to work at the local bread factory. Award-winning director Cristian Mungiu’s (4 Months 3 Weeks 2 Days) paints a gripping portrait of modern Romania riven by ethnic conflicts, economic resentment, and personal turmoil.

Reviews

‘Via long, unblinking takes and with a steady camera that occasionally switches to jerky handheld, Mungiu slowly reveals what’s really on his mind: a substrata of xenophobia, nationalism and racism that lies beneath it all.’
★★★★
Philip De Semlyen, Time Out

‘Mungiu’s touch is so deft and his filmmaking so enlivening, and the villagers so laughable (if also scary!), that you never feel dragged down or punished by the ugliness.’
Manohla Dargis, New York Times