Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days

The first thing to say is that this movie shook me to the core. It is one of the most well made and well acted movies I've seen in a long time. The second thing to say is that I don't think I will see it again for a long time...maybe ever. That's because, in addition to all of it's well deserved accolades -- including the top prize at Cannes last year -- it is also one of the most disturbing films I have ever seen.

Briefly, "Four Months, Three Weeks and Two Days" takes place during one harrowing day in Romania and tells the story of a woman and her friend attempting to get an illegal abortion during the last days of the Communist dictatorship there. In many ways, it echoes my favorite movie of last year, "The Lives of Others," in that it powerfully evokes the brutalization of the Communist system. But this movie, while not quite as good as "Lives," nonetheless speaks more to our political and cultural circumstances in this country, especially in an election year where abortion once again is likely to be the subject of much polarizing rhetoric, division and grandstanding.

When I said the movie was disturbing earlier, I meant that in the best possible sense, in that it is genuinely thought-provoking and that it's images and themes will haunt you and spark conversation long after you leave the theater. Director Cristian Mungiu deserves much credit for his ability to drain every ounce of tension from this situation, and I couldn't keep my eyes off of Anamaria Marinca, who was so believable and sympathetic in her portrayal of the friend whose story anchors the film.

In tone and its sense of lingering claustrophobia and doom, the movie also reminded me a lot of the Hitchcock thriller "Rear Window." But the movie's ability to disturb never rests on cheap thrills, rather from its brutal depiction of a nightmarish scenario that many of us argue about, philosophize on and sometimes even vote on, but (thankfully) seldom experience.

What makes this movie closer to art is that it eschews the easy polarities and arch rhetoric that constitute much of the abortion debate in this country ("pro-life" "pro-choice," "the lives of the unborn," "a woman's right to her own body," "partial birth," "back allies"...and so on) and instead depicts a situation in which everyone involved is brought down by a culture that devalues life in all its forms.

When my sister and I discussed the movie later, we were certain that the director, while offering fodder for all sides of the abortion question, was pro-life. It says something about the subtlety of his approach that I learned later we were wrong: He is adamantly pro-choice. And,just to prove once again that I truly have my finger on the pulse of nothing in this country, I was equally surprised to learn that many pro-life groups were highly critical of the film. There are some people in this world who can forgive anything but subtlety, I guess.

I do find it heartening that this year has brought two movies that have treated the notion of unwanted pregnancy with thoughtfulness, compassion and, yes, subtlety. I absolutely loved "Juno," which delved into roughly the same subject matter. But where "Juno" is acidly funny, light and ultimately heartwarming, "Four Months" is it's mirror opposite: brutal, unsparing and dark, dark, dark.

Anyhow, if you've thought at all about this subject, I urge you to go see this movie. Go see it, and then talk to me later. I'll be thinking about it for a long time.