Transylvania (2006)
Directed by Tony Gatlif

Film Review

Tony Gatlif's longstanding fascination with travelling communities - in particular the Romany gypsies - has allowed him to carve a highly idiosyncratic niche in French cinema that has earned him international recognition.  Since the early 1980s, Gatlif has provided colourful insights into the various nomadic cultures across the world, his vibrant use of visuals and traditional music taking us right into the heart of ways of living that are breathtakingly alien to virtually all westerners.  Even when his films are patently lacking in narrative substance and strong central characters, they are still beguiling, suffused with a raw humanity and lyricism that is hard to resist.

Coming in the wake of the well-received and masterfully crafted Exils (2004), Transylvania immediately strikes you as a lesser work.  There is next to nothing in the way of plot, just a free-flowing narrative that feels like nothing more than a touristy random walk through a foreign culture.  As photogenic as she is, the lead actress Asia Argento tends to get lost amid the cultural overload that Gatlif feels impelled to share with us, and what the director delivers feels like a somewhat half-hearted attempt to hammer a first-person perspective onto a poorly defined ethnographic documentary.

For the most part, Transylvania can't help looking like an over-stuffed compilation of Gatlif's earlier work - Latcho Drom (1993), Gadjo dilo (1997) and Vengo (2000) - without achieving the sublime artistic coherence of these enchanting films.  Yet despite its frustrating lack of focus and direction, Gatlif's Transylvanian odyssey does have something of the charm and mesmerising quality of the director's previous screen offerings.  The warmth of the people he films with such genuine respect and affection is effectively contrasted with the austere froideur of the inclement Rumanian landscape.  If anything, the gossamer-like storyline about an Italian girl's quest for love gets in the way of Gatlif's attempts to connect us with a fascinating foreign people.

Transylvania is more a zanily thrown together collage of sound and sight from exotic climes than a conventional piece of cinema - one where unfamiliar customs (including a milk-dowsing exorcism and other pagan ceremonies) frolic with even more bizarre human interactions to confound our senses, humorously challenging our notion of normality.  It is a demanding piece for anyone unfamiliar with Gatlif's distinctive work, and without the presence of a Romain Duris to provide a solid point of connection it's pretty hard-going even for the most ardent fans of this director.  However, as a statement of the seductive power of an alien culture it is highly effective, and only a soulless vampire would fail to be seduced by the beautifully shot vistas that Gatlif captures with such guileless artistry.

Film Synopsis

On discovering she is pregnant, a young Italian woman named Zingarina makes up her mind to find the man, Milan Augustin, who put her in this unfortunate condition.  The couple were passionately in love, until one day Milan abruptly ended the affair and went off in search of pastures new in Transylvania.  Accompanied by her best friend Marie and a friendly interpreter Luminitsa, Zingarina leaves her home in France and begins her Transylvanian quest in earnest, determined to bring about a reconciliation with the man she still loves to distraction.

Unfortunately, Milan's feelings have not altered one iota since he abandoned his pregnant girlfriend and Zingarina's attempts to win him back prove totally futile.  Acting on impulse. the desolate young woman ditches her travelling companions and hooks up with an itinerant gypsy girl.  As she strays further into this strange and beguiling land, Zingarina becomes increasingly enchanted by the unusual customs and habits of all those she encounters.  She soon develops a close rapport with a travelling merchant named Tchangalo, cementing her love for a country and people unlike any she has ever known...