Utopian musings about reinventing the rules of football.
Romanian New Wave director Corneliu Porumboiu (12:08 East of Bucharest) interviews his eccentric boyhood friend Laurențiu Ginghină. Ginghină is a middle-aged civil servant who has had a long-standing dream of reinventing the rules for the game of football: make them more streamlined, get rid of limitations, round off the edges of the field, organize players by zones and in subteams, etc.
Porumboiu’s second documentary about his beloved game of football – after The Second Game – is a reserved and minimalist film packed in his characteristic, dry-as-dust humour. Its threatening simplicity invites reflections about the relationships between rules and personal freedom, and the director subtly reveals the tension between fleeing into Utopian musings and tackling real, concrete problems.
Corneliu Porumboiu, Romania, 2018, 70’
w/ Offscreen
