ION, THE LUST FOR LAND

“The characters’ trajectories intertwine and merge into a fresco crafted with a sense of proportion, with accents that are either attenuated or highlighted with remarkable fluency.”

“Titus Popovici and Mircea Mureşan have discovered in the novel Ion, beyond its realistic style and psychological substance, structures and resonances of popular epic, pouring the material into a form that borrows and distills harmoniously, ennobling them, the means of overproduction and television series.”

“(The film) lucidly aspires to fresco-like dimensions. Director Mircea Mureșan attempts to integrate into a structure both the austere pathos (demonstrated in “The Uprising”) and the balladic tone (adopted in ‘The Hatchet’), as well as the notations that bring together atmospheric and portraitistic suggestions.”

“Fighting fiercely for Baciu’s daughter Ana’s dowry, the poor Ion is, in fact, in love with Florica.”

“Faithful to the spirit of Rebreanu’s novel, the film is the creation of a skilled craftsman who knows how to effectively stage the important moments of the plot, such as the confrontation at the dance or Ion’s seduction of Ana, but also how to give the film a sustained rhythm and maintain tension in the seemingly calm sequences. The scene at the mill, for example, in which Vasile realizes that Ana is pregnant not by Gheorghe, as he had believed, but by Ion, is anthological, and the noise of the machinery, which becomes dominant on the soundtrack, resonates with the turmoil of the disillusioned father.”