Portrait of the Fighter as a Young Man (2010) User Reviews (7)

A beautiful movie worth to be watched not only by the Romanian citizens but by any foreigner!

[anamariagram · 9/10 · 28 January 2011]

Indeed, first of all, I consider that this movie should be seen by as many Romanian citizens as possible (at least this is my wish and the main purpose of this review) but I think that any foreigner can also enjoy its beauty.

Why all the Romanian citizens should see this movie? A part of the answer to this question results directly from reading the synopsis. Still, I will add a few words. I consider that the story showed in this movie is among the few historical facts which could help us (Romanian citizens – mainly the young generation) not to be so ashamed of our people's cowardice shown during the communist period, until the '89 Revolution.

This is the story of a few courageous (if not insanely courageous) young men fighting the Monster, or just in fact opposing the Monster (until the presumed arrival of the Americans). They fight also their fear of death, strangely enough by trying to concentrate on another fear - more important – that of being condemned by their sons of cowardice.

The other part of the answer is the same as for the question "Why should any other foreigner see this movie?" and I will try to present the other qualities of the movie, beside the story.

I liked a lot the script because there are a lot of smart lines. I liked especially the sequences that show in parallel: 1) the speeches of the police (securitate) with the all the necessary instructions in order to catch the enemy and 2) the scenes with the interrogations and torturing taking place in reality – not quite following the soft indications given from above … . The alternation of these two "worlds" is made brilliantly and is more effective then any documentary movie with a 3 hours speech on the inhumanity of the communist regime.

I was deeply moved by two scenes which showed the love of a mother and the love for a friend. I don't remember such similar powerful scenes in any other movie. Of course, I might be subjective in my preference, but I am sure they will move you too.

I liked the way the director chose to shoot the group scenes with the young heroes. In some of them nothing happens indeed (as action) but they show so much and make us understand them better and even entering (if we choose) the atmosphere. You can feel the high grass touching you also, the cold raindrops dripping on your skin as well…

I liked the alternation of the colored scenes with the (more rare) black and white scenes. The scenes in black and white are shown blurry and I found them very appropriate for the story and they added a lot of beauty to the movie. Beside these sequences in black and white, there are a lot of very beautiful images (the landscapes in Fagaras' mountains; the portraits of our heroes and of the other characters in different situations, using different lights and shadows …).

Why not a 10 then? Only a nine … Mainly, because the actor playing the main character is not succeeding to convince us that he feels, he understands the profound and beautiful lines … But, as he speaks pretty rare this doesn't affect the movie that much.

It's already too long this review … but I hope that at least it will serve its' purpose.

mediocre directing concerning an amazing story

[ilajustatore · 7/10 · 18 November 2010]

I have seen this movie in the spring 2010 (I think...) at its first public showing in Bucharest (right after the world premiere in Germany, if I remember correctly).

I must start that I personally believe that it is an extremely difficult task to portray a character like Ion Gavrila Ogoranu (and along, his friends, the people around, etc).

Ion Gavrila Ogoranu is a (up to now) little known Romanian anti- communist hero. Being little known means by no means that he was little. to the contrary, to the persons knowledgeable of the fight against communism in Romania he is THE Legend. And this is for a very simple and unique reason: by a combination of intelligence, inspiration and pure chance he managed to stay free (not get caught by the communists) from the communist occupation till 1976 (most anti-communist fighters got caught before 1960...).

After the Romanian Revolution of 1990 he wrote his memoir: "Brazii se frang dar nu se indoiesc" (which is a word-play meaning literally "The pinetrees may break but they don't bend/doubt"; the word play is on the Romanian "indoiesc" which means both "bend" and "doubt"). The memoir contains a pretty accurate account of what happened in the 7 years while Ogoranu and his friends/pals stayed in the northern part of the Fagaras mountains and fought communism.

The book is full of amazing stories, happenings, thoughts, etc and folloows the life of Ogoranu and the persons around him up to and after his capture of 1976 (he even gives some thoughts about what he expected and what his impression is of the Romanian 1989 Revolution).

Unfortunately, the movie selects only a few events depicted in the book and unfortunately the thinking of those people gets very little attention (their motives behind their fight, the motives of the communists, the motives of the traitors etc etc). On the reason analysis part, the movie limits itself to select some discussions between those people and not even the most relevant. The rest of the movie is fight scenes (sometimes way too long) and montages (fighters resting in the grass,fighters eating, fighters bla bla) way too long too. Anyway i would not mind those, would the film be more deep in presenting what was really happening.

A by-effect of this superficial treatment of thoughts and events is also the fact that the movie misses almost entirely the fact that Ogoranu and those around him were sympathisers of the so called "Legionari" which were a nationalistic party in Romania before the communism (who were also at times quite close to the Nazis). This is not saying that Ogoranu was Nazi but he definitely had extreme rightwing views which might also be interesting to explore. I think it would have been extremely interesting to see how and why a person can be so right about one thing (fighting communism) and so wrong about another thing (being extreme right wing and antisemitic and so on).

Probably, if you don't know the story already there is a small chance for you to fully understand what was going on.

On the plus side, it is maybe the first movie I see where the bad guys get some screen time :)...There are scenese where you get to see the "Securitate (communist secret service)" guys making plans to catch Ogoranu. Unfortunately, in this case too, no talk about reasons, background, motives, etc.

I had much higher hopes of this movie and it was very disappointing for me probably because I know very well the history of the era.

I guess that if you want to see an action movie and get some initial (taste-opening) idea about what happened with the anti-communist fight in Eastern Europe, this is a good start.

It is a pity that such an amazing story (whether one likes or not Ogoranu, one has to admit the story was amazing) got directed by a beginner re. full-length movies.

However, for history buffs: a must see! And, there is a good chance that if you don't know the history of the era very well, you might enjoy a pretty good history action movie.

real sad fight

[valentinionut · 9/10 · 1 March 2020]

Tragic fight of few partisans against new order of state wich brought communism in an agrarian, a peasants country and lasted for 50 years in wich the nation s identity is altered. few fought and almost all died for that. let us not forget.

chronicle

[Vincentiu · 8 June 2012]

more than a film, it is a testimony. cruel, fresh, profound. a kind a documentary. instrument to stop forgiveness. so, the opinion must be more subtle. because the desire of director is obvious - build a chronicle of Romanian resistance against Communism. the story of Ioan Gavrilă - Ogoraru and his group. and the work was impressive, behind ordinary errors of this ambitious step, behind the Manichean parts, behind the passion who makes things only skin of shadows. it is a courageous project. sad, harsh, honest, far from pink surrogates. it is drawing of truth, sufferance and sacrifice. its seed - Memorialul durerii. its heart - the conscience of past as modeling of present. a gray movie. mixture of fear, ideal, mud and strong values. a lesson - film. about the root of a society. and a vision about fight against pure evil.

Devastating history

[bugnarmarcus · 10/10 · 18 August 2021]

As a romanian,i feel sad for my grand and grand grand-parents for what they experienced in that period of time,communism didin t made people bright quite contrary.

theatre masks

[danidln · 6/10 · 14 October 2023]

The story of the anticomunist brotherhood led by Mosu' Ogoranu hidding in Fagaras mountins is barely known even in Romania. The director himself declared in an interview that he did not intended a political movie. He said that he wrote and directed a movie about powerlessness and despair. Some say that the main characters are controversial, that they were part of the extreme right imprisioned by the extreme left that took over the power in the years after WWll. The history will clarify this at sometime and it looks like the movie does not care about this historical debate. I see in the movie only some dreamers that wanted to be free. A very long movie. A jouney takes time and this movie is about a life journey. Judging by the title chosed by the writer and director, the movie looks more like the journey of a young man through hard times. The story of Mosu and his friends journey, looping around some wild forest in Carathian mountins, preserving their free spirits serves this purpose perfectly. The story of the anticommunist fighters is just the perfect vehicle.

For few years the fighters are in permanent movement, hiding in deep forests, surviving heavy winters, manytimes encircled and as many times escaping. They are the hunted. It is a story about hunters and hunted, and maybe about haunted..The hunters are hideous figures of the secret services. But there is too much Securitate in this movie-an exces of badly made, too explicit scenes where people's lifes, will, freedom and bodies are violated. The hideous figures well played by Razvan Vasilescu and George Constantin were ugly enough so to make people understand what they did to many for many years. The kids friends of Militia and the two women field workers traitors are short well made portreits foreshodowing the moral degradation that will seize the whole society for many years.

Though, I think that the main caracter of the movie is hidden. Its presence is only felt in movie. The Father character is the central figure of the movie. And he takes few incarnations in the movie. The father is the Party and he is incarnated in every secret service leader. The speeches of the Securitate leaders played by great actors like George Constantin, Razvan Vasilescu are perfect display of a tyranical father, he is the only voice and will and everyone else is listening in perfect discipline. I bet not even the dogs are free to bark when he is around. He spreads despair and powerlessness. He uses any form of violence to impose his will.

Stalin, the dictator, was named the Father by the east European people. For many freedom lovers the only way was to cross the state borders. The fighters of brotherhood escape for years from the traps made by the party hidding in the deep mountain forest. And until the end they refused to cross the borders like there is nothing else beyond. Life is only the fight and the hope till the end. I think in this movie the forrest is a metaphor for a refuge used by the unconscious when an authoritarian figure shadows everything.

The film has intresting scenes like the one when the fighters manifest their joy when "father" Stalin dies. It reminds my of the joy of the jews escaping on the roof of their train in "Train de vie" by Radu Mihaileanu. The brotherhood of Ogoranu hearing the news of the dictator death, deep hiden in their hole dug in the forest floor under the trees does not manifest a wholly joy, they act immature, singing just like some boys around a fire in the summer camp. The scene could have been better made, could have been the centre of the movie.

The freedom, peace and joy are felt only among friends and expresed in the movie in the black and white film in film scenes, like dreaming scenes, these are the only moments when the young men are truly happy together. The friends figures: the biology teacher, the peasant, Leu, they are all just touches of brush painting one portreit, the portreit of the artist looking for escape, for freedom.

It is a movie about young life dreaming for freedom and escaping an authority that never weakens. In the story, the main figure was the longest and only surviver, he manage to escape free till the end of the hard years of the opression. In the end, through the citings from Ogoranu' memories, and maybe the artist' oath the legacy is that the freedom is a commitment the ones that will choose to think freely make, despite the times and the many profiteers. The film is made like the actors are playing in the camp around the fire, they look like they feel great in that great nature picture but they act like they are just in a camp trip, never melting in the background, even after many years with the nature as the only shelter. The real fighters must have survived the heavy winters only well knowing and living with the mountains. Definitely not a historical movie. History is just a pretext.

for not ignore the past legacy

[Kirpianuscus · 1 June 2017]

a testimony. this is its basic trait. an impressive proof about the force of history. a film about sacrifice for values. the theme is the most important challenge for director. because it is large and profound and subtle. because , except Memorialul durerii, does not exist a precedent to show the fight, the ideals and the sacrifice of few people, who, in the name of an ideal, fight against Comunist regime. but, ignoring the expectations, errors and good intentions, the film has a noble virtue - to be the first step to discover the truths of recent past. a form of exorcism. to remember, to show, to demonstrate, to maintain the image of a model alive. this is its basic purpose. and the motif to see it.