Child鈥檚 Pose
Calin Peter Netzer
StudioCanal
In the upper echelons of Romania鈥檚 nouveau riche, against a murky backdrop of corruption and excess, Child鈥檚 Pose probes into the caustic relationship between a domineering mother, Cornelia (Luminita Gheorghiu) and her adult son, Barbu (Bogdan Dumitrache).
When a 14-year-old boy is killed in a collision with Barbu鈥檚 speeding Porsche, Cornelia, a high-powered architect with a formidable address book, is eager to pull at the strings of her son鈥檚 life once again. Amid a palette of dark tones, Child鈥檚 Pose emerges as a film of contrasts: dressed in furs at the police station, Cornelia disregards the child鈥檚 grief-stricken parents to plot Barbu鈥檚 escape from prison, whatever the cost. Scrutinised frame by frame in an intrusive documentary style, the dysfunctional push-and-pull of Razvan Radulescu鈥檚 multilayered dialogue ignites Gheorghiu鈥檚 most monstrous and complex performance to date.
Indeed, Netzer鈥檚 claustrophobic account of loss, alienation and greed has as much to say about the family unit as the indifference of Romania鈥檚 class system: the centre will not hold.
Grace Caffyn