Graduation Poster

Graduation (2016)

Crime  
Rayting:   7.4/10 12.4K votes
Country: Romania | France
Language: Romanian
Release date: 22 September 2016

A film about compromises and the implications of the parent's role.

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jdesando 12 May 2017

A small Romanian film has universal implications: How do good people get drawn into corruption even if the ramifications are hardly worth the danger? Graduation tells of a decent doctor's (Romeo, Adrian Titeni) attempt to game the testing system so his daughter, Eliza (Maria Dragus) can go to the UK to study.

However, beyond this infraction lie other small corruptions that characterize a middle class in decline.Romeo has a mistress at his daughter's school. Because his wife is emotionally needy, his daughter sees her father's extramarital connection in need of addressing and expunging.

Although European mores are more accepting of these transgressions, the film implies that they nevertheless corrode everywhere. The film's pace is almost serene in the face of implications from an investigation into the cheating and the questionable actions of her boyfriend surrounding her assault. It seems no facet of the doctor's life is free from the ramifications of his peccadilloes.

The dialogue is spare but poignant--each character expresses feelings true to his or her development. The system is rife with corruption--no news to those who know Romania over the years. Yet built in is a subtle Nemesis waiting to pounce. While no single action of the doctor is earth moving, Romeo suffers the scorn of his wife and daughter, and he is slowly losing his mistress as she awakens to the needs of her future.

If you like character-driven drama with a modest dose of sermonizing but pleasant verbal dexterity throughout, then see Graduation. Everyone gets a diploma in life navigation:

"Eliza, you have to do your best. It'd be a pity to miss this chance. Some important steps in life depend on small things. And some chances shouldn't be wasted. You know, in '91, your Mum and I decided to move back. It was a bad decision." Romeo

fanierkan 14 October 2016

Fmovies: I have seen "graduation" at Filmekimi film festival in Istanbul today. Apart from the plot and impressive acting, I would like to point out a compelling detail about the movie: More than many times we watch the Romeo peeling and slicing several fruits such as apple, lemon and orange very skilfully, implying the analogy between this diligent action and his career as an experienced surgeon. There were also some hints in the movie resembling somewhat Nuri Bilge Ceylan's films. (Breaking of window glass in very first scene, suspicious interventions of the private life, etc). Nevertheless, Bacalaureat is a good sample of cinema which maintains the tension and asks unanswered questions throughout.

JvH48 13 March 2017

Seen at the Film Fest Ghent 2016 (website: filmfestival.be/en). In the last four years, I've seen several depressing movies about corruption in former Communist countries. It seems a popular topic in the area, as can be readily derived from noteworthy examples like Durak/The Fool (Bykov 2014), Dolgaya Schastlivaya Zhizn/A Long And Happy Life (Khlebnikov 2013), and Leviathan (Zvyagintsev 2014). Even though the movie at hand follows suit on the same path, it however winds up being not that depressing as the others. Especially the final scenes brought some silver lining for the country's future, albeit that I'm not so sure it is the actual message that the film makers try to drive home.

Anyway, the running time is more than 2 hours, but I could not spot any boring or redundant scene. Everything included in the script was necessary and useful, emphasizing how convoluted the tangled web became as woven by the various protagonists. It made abundantly clear that one step causes the next step, and so on and so on, until the point that no backpedaling is possible anymore. In other words, the original policy of our lead character Romeo may not have brought him wealth or influence in the past, yet his route was straightforward and devoid of complex deals deserving counter deals to make the circle round.

The threesome family seemed a happy family from the outset, which proved gradually untrue in small steps. The case was not that their problems were unnatural or far-fetched, therefore it took its time for the cracks to become visible. Progress developed slowly but steadily. It was a surprise, for me that is, that there was some sort of resolution in the end. It countered the assumed morale of this movie (my assumption), that there is no middle road in corruption: either one steers clear of it, or one gets involved in complex arrangements from which one cannot get loose once started.

All in all, two hours well spent while watching my favorite theme develop on screen, at the same time asking myself what I should have done in similar circumstances. Such thought provoking plots are very welcome, mostly also carrying an existential takeaway message hidden under an exercise for the viewer. We were taught that Honesty Is The Best Policy, but the plot of this movie lets you get doubts underway.

ncweil 26 May 2017

Graduation fmovies. Graduation, by Cristian Mungiu reviewed by NC Weil

This 2016 Romanian film by the director of 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, spans the time between a young woman's high school final exams and her graduation. Her father, a doctor, and mother, a librarian, though estranged (he sleeps on the couch and has a lover), both dote on their daughter, and their highest concern is her well-being. The girl is an excellent student, but the day before her exams she is attacked by a would-be rapist - in the scuffle her wrist is broken, but her violation goes far deeper than bones in a cast.

Her father, a precise, methodical, and - yes - kind man, is determined to see her go to university in the UK where she has been offered a scholarship (contingent on high exam scores). He will do anything to make that plan happen. The assault is one more reason - Romania, for him, is a dead end. He and his wife are stuck there, but for their daughter, it is not too late. She must leave.

The film opens with a rock shattering a window of their ground-floor apartment - the doctor certainly has a point about the benefits of living elsewhere - and he has labored to give her the chance to escape. But after the assault she gets cold feet.

Strip away the differences between Romania's culture and our own, and the film boils down to a father wanting what he is convinced is best for his near-adult daughter, with his intentions overriding her own desires and distractions. Graduation is about leaving one phase of life to move into the next. The impossibility of planting your own experience directly into the heart and mind of a grown child is on painful display here - you have learned the hard way what you should have done, but she, rationally or not, has to make her own choices.

For a parent, relinquishing control can mean one's life has truly been wasted - you didn't save yourself, and you can't save her either. But she's no longer yours to control - to insist on obedience is to keep her dependent, unable to be any kind of adult. In the end, that stunting is probably a worse trap than whatever limits her bad decisions impose. Mungiu's sympathy for all his characters forces us to recognize that everyone, no matter how corrupt or self-serving, is just trying to make the best of the life they're stuck in. Futility outranks evil in his compromised worldview.

dromasca 24 October 2016

The Romanian 'New Wave' is not that new any longer. For the last decade Romanian directors succeeded to surprise viewers and juries with their films dealing with hardships of life under the Communist dictatorship, and about the period that followed immediately, a time that carried the sequels of the dictatorship in the difficult transition that the country has undergone. It's kind of a revenge and recovery both from an artistic but also an attitude point of view, because Romanian cinema was deeply affected by censorship, and the directors of the previous generations enjoyed less freedom than their colleagues in other former Communist countries, having to either compromise, or had their movies severely chopped of, if not simply interdicted. The result was that with very few exceptions both the value and the message of the Romanian films before 1989 was null. More than a decade had to pass, and a new generation of film makers to appear in order to fix and start the recovery process. Results are however brilliant. Cristian Mungiu is one of the best representatives of the new school of directors, maybe the best. All his projects are followed with interest, and they do not disappoint, including 'Bacalaureat' (Graduation).

Interestingly enough, the films are differently perceived by the Romanian and foreign audiences, and this was clear in the reception and commentaries at the Haifa International Film Festival where I saw the film, as well as in the questions that lead role actor Adrian Titieni was asked from the audience after the screening. He was quite careful in pointing that the film should be taken as what it is, meaning one film representing maybe one facet of the Romanian reality, but not all of it.

There are two main themes in the film: First it's about the generation gap, about parents sacrificing everything for what they perceive as best for their kids - but is this 'everything' the best or even good? Same as in 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, the film that brought him the Palme d'Or, the hero of Mungiu's latest film crosses the borders of law and buries his own moral rules in order to help. It's just that here it's not about helping the best friend, but his own kid (same them as in another Romanian production that I liked - Child's Pose) but by doing this he becomes the master of her destiny - is this really for her good? His goal is to save her from the generalized atmosphere of corruption, from the endless chain of relations the Romanian society and life seem to be built upon, but in order to save her from the system he needs to become part of it. This is the second important theme. The Romanian director seems seems to look around in anger, at his own broken dreams, at the lost opportunities of his generation who could have made a difference but did not have the courage to do it, ending in compromise.

The role of Adrian Titieni is very similar with the one in Illegitimate which I had seen in the previous evening at the festival, but more complex, and the direction style is very different. Mungiu seems to control very tight his actors and makes sure that all intended nuances are there, while Adrian Sitaru, the director of Illegitimate gave much more freedom to the actors, who could improvise and build their own version of the characters. The result is impressing in both movies, confirming Titieni as one of the best film actors of his generation.

Interestingly enough, the two movies end both in similar manners, with a still snapshot photo - in

davidbasic 17 March 2017

Fist of all, Romanian movies are the most unique movies I've ever seen, so they deserve to be watched and talked about among those who watch. Bacalaureat (Graduation) is an example how you can make a masterpiece without extraordinary script, how you can see the very best of acting without some special dialogues, effects, etc. For those who are admirers of Hollywood this is not a perfect thing to watch. There is nothing special in this movie, nothing extraordinary, uncommon... However Bacalaureat is one of the most beautiful thing I've seen during the last few years. Romanians should be teachers to the other directors. I'm not sure if Romanians should say "thanks" to communism and isolation during the last century, I am not sure whether this is their way to express the feelings that they've had in the past. I am sure that this movie is a diamond among overambitious titles.

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