The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005) dir. Cristi Puiu

Dante Remus Lazarescu, a loner alcoholic living with dozens of cats, finds himself dealing with a number of ailments, which show no signs of getting better. After his neighbors recognize how serious his condition is, they call an ambulance, which takes him to the nearest hospital. However, due to a major bus crash with a high fatality rate and the general indifference of the medical professionals, Mr. Lazarescu’s condition worsens overnight.

I found myself strangely moved by The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (2005). It’s undoubtedly a slow movie, but it’s a slow story that works to its advantage. I felt just as alienated as Mr. Lazarescu was as he’s being ferried from hospital to hospital, unsure of where he’s going as arrogant doctors blame him for his current state and bully him for knowing more about his condition than they do. This was story was both incredibly infuriating and quite sad; here’s a man who has very little in the way of companionship and who is disregarded as a waste of space in an environment where care for patients is supposed to be top priority. But despite the bleakness, there are moments of absurdity that capture the feeling of Eastern European cinema. For example, when Mr. Lazarescu is shepherded to an urgent care center, the camera follows the ambulance worker taking his sweet time with alerting other doctors as an “urgent” sign flashes front and center. And while the doctors’ arrogance when dealing with Mr. Lazarescu are rage- inducing, there is a bit of hilarity in the fact that the entire healthcare system is depicted as neglectful at best and downright inhospitable at worst. Cristi Puiu wants his audience to feel as helpless as the title character, but he’s also reminding us that one is allowed to laugh in a world as nihilistic as this one. With that laughter, there is opportunity for a speck of agency.

One film I can think of that shares thematic similarities is Colonel Redl (1985). Although Colonel Redl is a semi-historical film about a real-life controversial figure that takes place during pre-WWI Hungary, both films share a slow pace that ratchets up the tension much better than any thriller. Both Redl and Mr. Lazarescu come from modest backgrounds that merit scorn from higher authorities, whether it be the aristocrats who look down on Redl for coming from the “untrustworthy” town of Galicia or the doctors who blame Mr. Lazarescu for his own misfortune. While both Redl and Mr. Lazarescu are flawed characters, they are both victims of a bureaucratic system that places them at the bottom of the totem pole from which they must prove themselves. In his article about his book Goodbye, Eastern Europe!, Jacob Mikanowski describes how “the stories of Eastern Europe offer another way of looking at the world. They are a reminder that we are not always the masters of our own fate. Sometimes history acts without our cooperation, and the only way to meet it is with resignation or a laugh,” (Mikanowski 15). In The Death of Mr. Lazarescu, resignation and laughter go hand in hand.

Works Cited

Mikanowski, Jacob. “Goodbye, Eastern Europe!” Los Angeles Review of Books, 27 Jan. 2017.