La Gomera (2019)

La Gomera: Directed by Corneliu Porumboiu. With Vlad Ivanov, Catrinel Marlon, Rodica Lazar, Sabin Tambrea. Not everything is as it seems for Cristi, a policeman who plays both sides of the law. Embarking with the beautiful Gilda on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception.

“La Gomera a.k.a. u0026quot;The Whistlersu0026quot; is a fun Romanian neo-noir borrowing suspense tropes from James Cain, Robert Siodmak and Jules Dassin. The premise is a cop (no unreliable voice overs here) who had to learn the idiom of the whistling language for communicating with people living in interstitial spaces inside and outside of the law. Offbeat, at times hilarious in a deadpan way and rife with truly beautiful mise en scène, the film is a deconstructed tribute to this specific and particular film genre but operates outside of it. All the characters are vividly drawn, the supporting ones carry out the one-dimensionality of their roles with a certain lived-in freshness. The use of music was also very tasteful and deliberately operatic as counterpoint to the life-and-death situations, quirkily told. Corneliu Porumboiu seems to be having fun directing this story — it shows and I for one was swept by the story and storytelling.”