EIGHT POSTCARDS FROM UTOPIA

Seamlessly arranged within a vibrant collage, a series of advertising films tells of life in post-socialist Romania and the transition from communism to a market-based economy. In eight postcards – eight chapters – filmmaker Radu Jude and philosopher Christian Ferencz-Flatz tackle life's big subjects: love and death, the human body and its fragility, nature and the supernatural. EIGHT POSTCARDS FROM UTOPIA turns the fictitious and often absurd medium of the advert into a magnifying glass capable of revealing society's desires, convictions, hopes and fears. Situated somewhere between found poetry and outdated encyclopaedia, between trash art and Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica, this self-aware experimental film takes no prisoners in its hilarious reckoning with meta-capitalist mythology, as national pride collides with consumer culture. The result of this unconventional approach is a unique contemporary document that sheds light on capitalism's incursion into Romania, with all of its lavish promises.