La Gomera, by C. Porumboiu, Romania’s Entry at the Oscars

La Gomera, the fifth feature film by Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu, is Romania's entry for the 2020 Academy Awards

Corina Sabău, 29.09.2019, 14:33

La Gomera, the fifth feature film by Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu, is Romanias entry for the 2020 Academy Awards. It opened in Romanian theaters on September 13. La Gomera is among the Romanian movies to be nominated for the European Film Academy awards, premiered at Cannes this year, and had its North American premiere at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival, in the Masters section. Before the Romanian premiere, we talked to a part of the team that made the movie. We talked to director Porumboiu, actresses Rodica Lazar and Catrinel Marlon Menghia, and actor George Pistereanu. Porumboiu said that La Gomera is a natural continuation of his preoccupations as a filmmaker. He believes his movie is a policier thriller, and is happy he was accepted at the Oscars for the running. Here he is talking about it:

“I was very honored. I cant wait to see the reception in Romanian cinemas, that is my main concern. That is because festivals are a great glue between directors, films, and movie theaters. I worked very well with the actors, I worked with Vlad Ivanov on several other projects, and it was always great. In fact, it was a pleasure working with all the actors in the movie. In the end, when you watch a movie, you see the actors first. And if the actors arent good, you may have the best script, the best idea, but the movie wont work. At least half my work as a director consists of that, working with actors.”

The character played by Rodica Lazar in La Gomera is called Magda, who is a prosecutor. She described her as a nuanced character, with a sense of humor, who I enjoyed playing a lot.” We asked her what kind of challenges she faced playing the third prosecutor in her career, and what made her take it on:

“It is a beautiful story, first and foremost it was the story. Then it was Corneliu Porumboiu himself, hes a challenge. All the characters are special, mysterious, La Gomera is a different kind of movie from his other movies, it was shot and edited differently. I didnt have to put on weight, or shave my head, it was none of that kind of challenge. However, it was a challenge for me as an actress, because I wanted to live up to the story, which is very interesting, and live up to Corneliu Porumboius demands, to the level of my co-star Vlad Ivanov.”

The audience can admire Catrinel Melon Menghia as a femme fatale, Gilda, who is involved with the heads of the mafia on the island of La Gomera, where the locals use a whistling language. When he cast her in the role, he told her she should try to play the part as if she was Rita Hayworth in the film noir Gilda. Here is Catrinel Menghia:

“It was tough for me, I had a lot of night scenes, and at some point the fatigue started showing. Now I watched the movie for the second time, and I thought the fatigue showed clearly in my eyes, but that screened fairly well, I seemed very focused in those scenes. It was difficult, we got caught in winter, summer, spring, but it was great. I can say we were like a big family, something that had never happened to me before, and neither did it happen to my colleagues, as they told me. Especially when we were on location, on La Gomera, we were together all the time, the technical team, we, the actors, and the production team. I remember how close we were. We spent so much time together that Corneliu actually had to keep an eye on us to make sure we went to bed at a reasonable hour, so we can get enough sleep to start shooting first thing in the morning.”

Actor Geore Pistereanu plays in the movie an organized crime cop. As always, he prepared for his part thoroughly:

“I started my preparations like I do with all of my parts. I went to Organized Crime, I met a lady prosecutor there who answered all my questions, and put me in touch with cops who helped me. That period was the most important to figure out the character. We think we know a lot about policemen, gendarmes, but when you do research you realize that things are very different. As far as working with Corneliu Porumboiu, I understood right away what he wanted from me, and from my character, so we worked together very well. I worked great with Vlad Ivanov and Rodica Lazar, it is great luck to work with talented actors who actually deserve all their awards. I worked great with Istvan Teglas, my colleague from the National Theater in Bucharest, it is great for an actor who doesnt want to stagnate to have good partners.”

La Gomera is Porumboius first film shot outside Romania, namely in Spain and Singapore.