Andrew Pulver 

The Happiest Girl in the World

Ironic light is shed on post-communist Romania in this amusing, if not especially hard-hitting satire, says Andrew Pulver
  
  

The Happiest Girl in the World, directed by Radu Jude
Nothing to smile about ... The Happiest Girl in the World Photograph: PR

Romania has perhaps not turned out to be the cinema powerhouse it briefly threatened after the success of 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and The Death of Mr Lazarescu; but this gentle, droll satire is well worth watching as it takes aim at the confusions of the post-communist world in an oblique, subtle way. Not-especially-prepossessing teenager Dora travels to the capital Bucharest, there to be filmed as part of a promotional spot for an orange juice company. It gradually emerges she has won a new car in a competition, and her parents are desperate to sell the thing off while it's still new; sulky Dora, on the other hand, wants to keep it for herself. These tensions work themselves out as they endure a laborious day on a film set, enabling writer-director Radu Jude to get in various jabs at the fractious nature of a commercials shoot – presumably a relatively new sector of Romanian film-making.

 

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