THE EXTRAS (1987) – drama film online

Directed by: Malvina Urșianu
Script by: Malvina Urșianu
Cast: Mariana Buruiană, Gina Patrichi, Gheorghe Dinică, George Constantin, Stela Popescu, Daniel Tomescu, Val Paraschiv, Maria Rotaru, Emilia Dobrin Besoiu, Sanda Toma, Gilda Marinescu, Simona Bondoc, Ioana Ciomîrtan, Wilhelmina Câta, Anda Caropol, Corneliu Revent, Geo Saizescu, Eusebiu Ștefănescu, Viorel Comănici, Ion Niciu, Theodor Danetti, Jean Lorin Florescu, Constantin Bărbulescu, Dan Mizrahy, Ștefan Hagimă, Andrei Ionescu, Zephi Aleșec, Ion Roxin, Nicolae Ivănescu, Nicolae Praida, Elizeu Simulescu, Lucia Mureșan, Julietta Strîmbeanu Weigel, Migri Avram Nicolau, Valeria Rădulescu
Producer: Constantin Dinu
Cinematography by: Alexandru Întorsureanu, Sorin Ilieșiu
Edited by: Adina Georgescu Obrocea
Sound: Andrei Papp
Music: Aurelian Octav Popa
Year: 1987
Category: Feature film
Genre: Drama
Duration: 124 minutes

PLOT SUMMARY

In her struggle for a decent life, Leonora (Mariana Buruiană), a young woman from a bourgeois family, faces the disadvantage of her social background, which has fallen out of favor with the new regime. Along with other fallen members of the bourgeoisie, she is forced to appear as an extra in a propaganda film condemning the morals of this class.

AWARDS

• 1987 – ACIN – Best Director Award (Malvina Urșianu)
• 1987 – ACIN – Best Set Design Award (Marcel Bogoș)
• 1987 – ACIN – Best Actress Award (Mariana Buruiană)
• 1987 – ACIN – Special Jury Prize (Gheorghe Dinică)
• 1987 – Costineşti – Special Jury Prize (Malvina Urşianu)
• 1987 – Costineşti – Best Set Design Award (Marcel Bogoş)
• 1987 – Costineşti – Best Actress Award (Mariana Buruiană)

CRITICAL REVIEWS:

“With ’The Extras’, Malvina Urșianu revisits the fates of some of the characters from the film ’On the Left Bank of the Blue Danube’ — from which she extracts several sequences, re-edited into a sort of ‘flashback’ and ‘prelude’ at the same time… Here, it should be noted that — although they belong to the same thematic universe — the two films are written in different tones, so that the mere recollection of the former does not, ipso facto, constitute the most fitting introduction to the atmosphere of the latter; just as the narrative elements cited do not shed sufficient light on clarifying the relationships between the characters in the new film.” – Nicolae Ulieriu, Săptămâna, October 23, 1987 – aarc.ro

“A crazy, upside-down world, which the director keeps in the frame until all the meanings become clear, and ‘The Extras’ firmly establishes itself as a mirror of a well-known historical moment.” – Eva Sârbu, “Cinema” magazine, 1987

“If in ‘On the Left Bank…’ the tragicomic focus was sharply centered on the character of Zaza, the ‘girl of the people,’ a former cabaret dancer who dips her toe into the ‘sea’ (the bourgeoisie) and discovers that the ‘sea’ rejects her, just as the human body rejects a transplanted organ, and thus finds herself at a historical turning point, rejected by everyone, burdened by a difficult past, doubly compromising — as a former ‘artist’ and as a ‘former’, two equally false personas, yet ones that function as genuine, in ‘The Extras‘ the focus shifts to Leonora, who has, in turn, become a person with a compromising past.” – Eva Sârbu, “Cinema” magazine, 1987

“Despite (or rather, precisely because of!) the extremely disparate elements from which the film’s soundscape is composed — capturing with remarkable authenticity a vast social universe in the midst of profound transformation — the music of ‘The Extras’ exhibits that organic unity which is always ensured by the sum of its parts.” – Luminița Vartolomei, “Cinema” magazine no. 11, November 1987 – aarc.ro

“When Leonora’s final performance ends in disarray, the audience is confronted with the profound futility of the shattered citadel. The meticulously individualized small cinematic portraits fade into the vast fresco created with such force and personality by Malvina Urșianu.” – Mădălina Stănescu, “Cinema” magazine no. 11, November 1989 – aarc.ro

“In nearly all her films, Malvina Urșianu presents herself as a restorer of time — time that passes inexorably — of this ‘unending hemorrhage,’ of this irreversibility that humanity, whether ‘past’ or ‘future’, feels with unspeakable drama. While ideologically everything is cut and dried, on a strictly human level the director shows a profound understanding for both sides, because she knows the bundle of contradictions called ‘human’ and understands the good and the evil it can bring into the world. But, at the same time, the director does not forget that man is the only creature capable of transforming and being transformed.” – Constantin Pivniceru, “Cinema” magazine no. 11, November 1987 – aarc.ro

“Speaking of Malvina’s idiosyncrasies and the coherence of her work, it should be noted that in ‘The Extras’ she quotes herself. The film being shot, in which former bourgeois serve as extras, bears a striking resemblance to ‘Serata’ . In ‘Nobody Lives Here Anymore’, she alludes to ‘A Light on the Tenth Floor’ through references to detention and by quoting a central sequence featuring a woman desperately climbing the stairs of an apartment building at a climactic moment. This trilogy/ tetralogy is often cited as the one closest to her own life, as she identifies with this perpetually out-of-sync Leonora.” – Alex Mircioi, F-Sides-Chronicles, f-sides.ro

“There is a constant need for familiarity and rediscovery that plays out through her female characters, from ‘Fleeting Loves’ to ‘A Light on the 10th Floor’. Seen in this light, a propaganda film like ‘The Extras’ ends up speaking discreetly about lost parental figures and the soul of a young woman who risks losing herself in the political struggles of the times.” – Augustin Cupșa, cinepub.ro

“The agony of the aristocracy reaches the point of the grotesque; it seems as though even the sets are crumbling along with them. What in Petru Dumitriu’s novel possessed a sublime gradation, a nuanced epic unfolding, an ambivalent narrative, and numerous relativizations of political and social truth, in this film adaptation quickly descends into the trivial and the derisory. While the boyars become ‘extras’ on the stage of life, the young new people populate the set with artificial movements and speak in quotes from the ideology of class struggle.” – Augustin Cupșa, cinepub.ro

TRIVIA:

• The Extras is conceived as an indirect sequel to the film On the Left Bank of the Blue Danube (1983), revisiting the characters at a different age and in a different existential context.
• The film follows the fates of characters from a “shattered citadel” (an aristocratic world destroyed by history), now reduced to mere marginal figures.
• The character Lenora, introduced as a young girl in the previous film, becomes the adult protagonist here (played by Mariana Buruiană), marking the continuity of memory and identity.
• The film explicitly explores the theme of history’s “extras”: people who no longer actively participate in the collective destiny but are reduced to secondary roles, spectators of their own lives.
• The concept of the “extra” takes on a metaphorical and political dimension: it concerns de-individualization and the loss of social status within a system that rewrites hierarchies.
• The film fits into the director’s thematic line regarding the survival of aristocratic memory in a hostile world, being one of her clearest commentaries on the historical rupture caused by communism.
• Born in 1927 in Vâlcea County to an aristocratic family, Malvina Urșianu built her entire filmography around the theme of the disappearance of a world and social decline, a recurring motif in The Extras as well.
• She discovered cinema at the age of 8, in a makeshift space — a defining experience that shaped her artistic destiny.
• After initially studying law (under family pressure), she dropped out and enrolled in Jean Georgescu’s film courses, later becoming an assistant director for filmmakers such as Victor Iliu, Dinu Negreanu, and Marietta Sadova.
• In the 1950s, her career was abruptly interrupted for political reasons: her projects were confiscated, she was investigated, arrested, and barred from the film industry for approximately 8–10 years. After her release, she remained under surveillance for a period and was denied the right to work.
• She did not return until 1967 with The Monalisa Without a Smile, a film that marked the beginning of a coherent and deeply personal filmography.
• Malvina Urșianu is considered a rare example of a total auteur: she wrote and directed all her films, and the female characters often function as autobiographical projections, reflecting traumas, emotional failures, and moral tensions.
• Her collaboration with actress Silvia Popovici is essential: she becomes a veritable alter ego of the director in several films (Serata, Fleeting Loves, The Return of King Lăpușneanu).
• The recurring themes of her work include: the fate of women in relation to history, memory, and political trauma; the decline of the aristocracy and the old elites; and the individual reduced to a secondary role within an oppressive historical mechanism

LINES:

 • “Milk? God forbid! Give me a shot of brandy — milk makes me sick!” – Zaza (Gina Patrichi)
• “We’re not has-beens! We’re professional artists. We used to be a famous duo—Zaza and Zaraza!” – Zaraza (Stela Popescu)
• “We don’t like depressed people. The joy of life and work is the moral foundation of our society.” — The Director (Geo Saizescu)
• “An orange! Who brought it to you? Do you have connections with foreigners?” — Costi Bengescu (George Constantin)
• “I need a name to break into Europe!” – Zaza (Gina Patrichi)
• “If dancing is needed, we know how to dance!” – Zarava (Stela Popescu)
• “Where’s that little, funny guy?” – The Director (Eusebiu Ștefănescu)
• “You would have been better off buying yourself some new shoes.” – Leonora Bengescu (Mariana Buruiană)
• “For now, I have no future. I only have a past. Or rather, several.” – Leonora Bengescu (Mariana Buruiană)
• “The jewelry was fake. Who can trust the nobility anymore!” — Butler Matei (Gheorghe Dinică)
• “Today is the day for those who work honestly.” — Butler Matei (Gheorghe Dinică)

ARTICLES:

• Review: “The Extras (1),” by Nicolae Ulieriu – aarc.ro
• Review: “The Extras (2),” by Nicolae Ulieriu – aarc.ro
• Review: “Gaining Identity”, by Magda Mihăilescu – aarc.ro
• Review: “The Extras”, by Eva Sîrbu – aarc.ro
• Review: “The Enchanted Flute”, by Luminița Vartolomei – aarc.ro
• Review: “The Gallery of Background Portraits”, by Mădălina Stănescu – aarc.ro
• Review: “A Perfect Unity: As Much Direction as There Is Image”, by Constantin Pivniceru – aarc.ro
• Review: “Malvina Urșianu Between the Pages of History”, by Alex Mircioi – f-sides.ro
• The Extras, 1987 – tvr.ro
• How director Malvina Urșianu was forced to stay away from film sets for ten years – adevarul.ro
• Malvina Urșianu – an aristocrat of Romanian cinema – contraford.md
• Călin Căliman: Malvina Urșianu, the grand dame of auteur cinema – contemporanul.ro
• Malvina Urşianu has passed away. The director was 88 years old – ziarulmetropolis.ro
• Malvina Urşianu Retrospective – arhiva.unatc.ro

This premiere is part of a national archive project supported by the Romanian National Film Centre.
Special thanks goes to the Romanian Filmmakers Union and to the Romanian Film Archive.

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