CHARLESTON (2017) – drama film online

Directed by: Andrei Crețulescu
Script: Andrei Crețulescu
Cast: Șerban Pavlu, Radu Iacoban, Ana Ciontea, Victor Rebengiuc, Dorian Boguță, Vlad Galer, Adrian Titieni, Gavril Pătru, Sergiu Costache, Claudiu Dumitru, Gabriela Popescu, Lucian Ifrim, Gheorghe Ifrim, Andreea Vasile, Letiția Vlădescu, Alina Berzunțeanu, Ana Ularu, Iris Spiridon, Istvan Teglas, Rodica Lazăr, Emilian Oprea
Producer: ICON production, Les Films du Tambour
Cinematography by: Barbu Bălășoiu
Edited by: Cătălin Cristuțiu
Sound: Nicolas Waschkowski, Marius Leftărache, Yann Legay
Music: Massimiliano Nardulli
Year: 2017
Category: Feature film
Genre:  Drama
Duration: 118 minutes

45,874 – Cinepub viewers

PLOT SUMMARY

A few weeks after the death of his wife, Ioana, and on the night of his 42nd birthday, Alexandru receives a bizarre “present” to say the least: a visit from the younger Sebastian, who claims to have been Ioana’s boyfriend for the past five months… “more or less”. “Charleston” is the bittersweet story of an absurd love triangle “made up” of two men and the woman they both lost.

AWARDS:

• 2019 – Gopo Awards – Best Original Music – Massimiliano Nardulli
• 2017 – Chicago International Film Festival – “Gold Hugo” nomination
• 2017 – Locarno International Film Festival – “Golden Leopard” nomination for Best Film
• 2017 – Zagreb Film Festival – “Golden Bicycle” nomination for Best Film
• 2017 – Braunschweig International Film Festival – nomination “Der Heinrich” for Best Film
• 2018 – Transilvania International Film Festival (TIFF) – Best Film nomination
• 2018 – Vilnius International Film Festival – Best Debut Film nomination

CRITICAL REVIEWS:

• “Andrei Crețulescu is one of those brave directors, with ideas and stories totally different from what Romanian cinema has presented so far.” – Laura Mușat (filmsinframe.com, 2018)

• “Rarely a Romanian movie with such a potential audience” – cineuropa.org

• “Charleston is less cynical than the films of the Romanian New Wave and more tender.” – Chicago Sun-Times

• “Charleston is an accomplished movie, not least thanks to the impeccable acting recital of protagonists Șerban Pavlu and Radu Iacoban.” – nonsololocinema.it

• “The comparison to P.T. Anderson’s Magnolia may seem like sacrilege, but the audacious Charleston holds its own with ambition and pride.” – otroscineseuropa.com

• “Charleston is highly intelligent, often terribly funny, always sincere and warm.” – nospoilerrewiewz.com

• “Andrei Crețulescu steps in the footsteps of Jarmusch and Kaurismaki.” – zelluloid.de

• “A tender surrealism filmed with the same obsessive rigor from the first frame to the last, Charleston can be told as well as danced to. Adorable!” – pascalgavillet.ch

• “Heavy stuff, to be sure, but the movie’s narrative energy and dark comedy come from the pas de deux between the widowed Alexandru – a gruff, burly, hard-drinking macho man who isn’t quite sure how to mourn – and his departed wife’s lover, Sebastian, a sensitive, teary-eyed romantic who arrives on Alexandru’s doorstep one day, wearing his heart on his sleeve.” – Chrtistopher Vourlias (variety.com, 2018)

• “For audiences expecting the muted long takes and somber aesthetic that has dominated the past decade of Romanian filmmaking, Crețulescu’s stylized touches owe more to Aki Kaurismaki or Wes Anderson than Romanian New Wave auteurs like Cristian Mungiu and Cristi Puiu. Cinematographer Barbu Bălăşoiu’s Bucharest is a vibrant, even sexy, counterpoint to the post-Soviet, grayscale graveyard that dominates Romanian cinema.” – Chrtistopher Vourlias (variety.com, 2018)

TRIVIA:

• Andrei Crețulescu is self-taught. He graduated in 2000 from the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures in Bucharest, worked at HBO for 12 years as an editor and producer and learned how to make a movie from start to finish.
• He and his wife, Codruța, started the production company „Kinosseur” in 2011. “I like to say that Codruța is my partner, my producer, my best friend and my wife.” (A.C.) Early on, they produced the black comedy “Killing Time“, directed by Florin Piersic Jr.
• “Charleston” is the director’s feature film debut, following shorts “Bad Penny“, “Kolwalski”, “Ramona“, “Seven Months Later”, all in (almost) the same cast.
• The screenplay of the movie is inspired by a story of his mother, Ioana (to whom it is also dedicated), a literary critic and a great cinema lover.
• Crețulescu says of his movie that “it is not a love movie, but rather a movie about love. (…) this movie was born out of my only real fear. I have many fears, not to mention social and political. But my real fear is that I will lose the one I love. That’s what I’m afraid of every day. That’s where this movie started.”
• The director also has a sense of humor outside of the cinematic product: “At the end of the movie you hear a seagull. It’s not a seagull. It’s a rubber duck with which I was signaling Iacoban to enter the frame. I left it, because they wanted to clean it during editing. People think it’s a seagull…” (A.C.)

LINES:

“That… what the hell was his name? Anyway, Planet of the Apes! (…) Michelangelo!”
“Charlton Heston.”
“Richelieu?”
“Charlton Heston.”
“John the Baptist?”
“Charlton Heston.”
“And get this – the coup de grace. When they needed the last man on Earth. The last, yeah? Can you tell me who played him?”
“Charlton Heston.”
“And get this – the coup de grace. When they needed the last man on Earth. The last one, right? You mind telling me who played him?”
“Charlton Heston.”
“That’s right. Omega Man.” – Maximilian (Dorian Boguță) and Alexandru (Șerban Pavlu)

“I never said I wasn’t a good actor. I said I wasn’t a great actor.” – Alexandru (Șerban Pavlu)

“We both think we need it (forgiveness). We are somehow in the same boat. (…) Forgive me, I didn’t mean to abuse fishing metaphors.” – Sebastian (Radu Iacoban)

“Look, I’m crying. Like an idiot. And I’m crying. I think I need you.” – Sebastian (Radu Iacoban)

“If you somehow decide to commit public suicide I’d be happy to take a look.” – Alexandru (Șerban Pavlu)

“And this one? Buddy with you?”
“Rather with my wife.”
“He seems a bit of a faggot.” – Ludovic (Gavril Pătru)

“Wait a minute. You mean you catch the fish and, instead of offering it with a brine, with a garlic cream, you throw it back in the water? You’re stupid! You put a hook in his snout, you pull him out of the water, he suffocates, you watch him struggling and, instead of throwing him on the barbecue, so that he understands why he suffers, you take the hook out of his mouth so that he can’t play the saxophone in his life and you let him go, to go to his family, to tell them about his shame! Does this torture have a name?”
“Fishing.” – Alexandru (Șerban Pavlu) and Sebastian (Radu Iacoban)

“You know where mujdei comes from, right? Mousse d’ail. Garlic cream. Romanianized, mujdei.” – Alexandru (Șerban Pavlu)

“The best for pheasants are beagles. And for partridges, also beagles. And for rabbits. You can’t go wrong with beagles. (…) If you want wild duck – cocker spaniel.” – Mr. Antonescu (Victor Rebengiuc)

“I want to be alone.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“What?”
“I don’t believe you want to be alone, because I don’t want to be alone.” – Alexandru (Șerban Pavlu) and Sebastian (Radu Iacoban)

“You’re impotent, alcoholic and lonely.” – Sebastian (Radu Iacoban)

ARTICLES:

• Andrei Crețulescu: “This movie was born out of my only real fear” – scena9.ro
• Andrei Crețulescu: “In my head, I wrote Charleston in two years; on paper, in two weeks” – iqads.ro
• Interview with Andrei Crețulescu, director of Charleston: “I made the movie to answer the question of whether you can love two different people at the same time” – anamariaonisei.ro
• “Charleston”, directed by Andrei Crețulescu, in Romanian theaters from summer – adevarul.ro
• Andrei Crețulescu: The world seems extremely violent to me – and those lenses get darker every day – filmsinframe.com
• Charleston – a funny movie about a sad subject – atelier.liternet.ro
• Charleston – a movie hard to pigeonhole into a genre – iqool.ro
• Charleston, director Andrei Crețulescu’s feature film debut, in theaters June 8 – mediafax.com
• INTERVIEW – Andrei Crețulescu, on “Charleston”, selected at Locarno: I want the audience to laugh, to cry, to feel. – news.ro
• Andrei Crețulescu Finds New Romanian Rhythm in Charleston: variety.com
• Andrei Crețulescu on Charleston: It’s the absurd/ emotional/ funny story of two men who lose the same woman. And it’s a very pop and very rerto – a movie that doesn’t want, at any cost, to leave you cold. On the inside, that is – life.ro
• Otherness and acceptance: Charleston (2017) – filme-carti.ro
• Charleston – Fiat 500 (red, vintage or the other way around?) – bookhub.ro

WATCH OTHER MOVIES